Gaea, 1966 - Lee Krasner

Lee Krasner's styled changed dramatically between 1940 and 1960. In the 40's, she preferred a tight, thickly painted small canvas where every line and color was under her aegis; Krasner's early work seems to abstract the work of the women who hollowed out a space for women's art. The large X's, the zig-zags and crosshatching recalls the deligent work of homemakers mending cloth items around the house — perhaps, even the bedsheets — in a sense, reproducing and reimagining the everyday life of the family and, thus, Woman.

In the 60's, Krasner's style exploded in their application of form, color and content. The canvases Krasner used during this period are enormous, often over five feet tall and ten feet wide. The paintings themselves are painted gesturally with single brush strokes requiring the body's full range of motion. Krasner's use of color is dynamic while simultaneously employing a more limited palette. Via splattering, smearing, rubbing and rolling, Krasner's colors blend together at their margins in unique swirls and gradients. The paintings' contents often take rounded shapes, resembling non-human life, the nude body, and the landscape. To continue the earlier metaphor, Krasner had finished her work inside of the house and, in the 1960's, had set out to free Woman from the home and discover Woman throughout the world.

In the author's opinion, Gaea (1966) is the pinnacle of Krasner's work in the 60's. A simple color scheme. Sensuous, voluptuous forms, recalling infantcy, the latency of sexuality, the fulfillment of desire and the return to it all. The pink feel like strawberry mother's milk. The purplish browns — Gaea herself. The off-toned white being nothing but the space the Mother is raising is in.

Lee Krasner, herself

So, what do you think about the painting? Do you have another favorite Krasner painting? Or, is it all just one big inkstain?