Helen Frankenthaler

“Helen Frankenthaler has been creating paintings that walk a tightrope between spontaneity and self-consciousness, improvisation and deliberation, dissolution and structure.”[1] This statement, published in The New York Times in 1983, captures the essence of Frankenthaler’s artistic practice. This balance can be seen especially clearly in the painting Tight Rope, created in 1969. The work is representative of Frankenthaler’s approach to painting in the 1960s, a period marked by a growing reduction of form. As she explained: “In the late ’60s I wanted to try my hand at more geometric shapes than I had been painting previously.” [2] Many works from this period consist of only one or two clearly defined forms, poured directly onto the canvas. Against this background, the title Tight Rope is easily understood. Like a stretched rope, a dark green painted line connects poured areas of rust red and earthy grey-green.

Already in the 1950s, Frankenthaler had developed a distinctive way of working with the Soak-Stain technique. Throughout her career, she constantly reinvented herself, yet remained true to her core vision.

While many of her contemporaries, such as Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland, worked in series during the 1960s, Frankenthaler rejected a serial approach. Nevertheless, a clear and recognizable visual language runs through her work of these years. This continuity became evident with her second solo exhibition and retrospective at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York in 1969. With subsequent stops at the Whitechapel Gallery in London and at further venues in Germany, 1969 — the year Tight Rope was created — marked Frankenthaler’s international breakthrough.

Helen Frankenthaler (1928–2011)

Tight Rope, 1969

Currently exhibited: Yes (Wolfgang Hollegha. Don't think, look!)

Material: Acrylic paint on canvas
Size: 174 x 148.8 cm
Inv-Nr.: B_596
Image rights: VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn; Copyright: Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, New York

Keywords:

• Abstract Expressionism
• Color field painting
• Soak-stain-technique