Willem de Kooning
Backyard on Tenth Street
1955
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Willem de Kooning
Backyard on Tenth Street
1955
Physical Qualities
Oil on canvas, Framed: 48 3/4 x 60 x 2 1/4 in. (123.8 x 152.4 x 5.7 cm) Sight: 48 x 59 1/2 in. (121.9 x 151.1 cm)
Credit Line
Frederic W. Cone Fund
Object Number
1956.158
Artists Elaine and Willem de Kooning lived together at 88 East 10th Street in New York City’s Manhattan borough from 1952 until their separation in 1957. In this work, part of a series of ten abstracted urban landscapes, Willem de Kooning swept a paint-laden brush across canvas to convey the essence of the city lot behind their apartment.
This block of 10th Street between 3rd and 4th Avenues housed bare-bones, live-work studios for artists as well as artist-run galleries. With the hangouts of the Cedar Tavern and the Club just a few blocks away, it was the heart of the art scene in mid-century Manhattan. De Kooning claimed this 10th Street scene as his own with a bold signature visible at top left.
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Kenneth B. Sawyer, 'Baltimore Museum of Art News', December 1956, pp. 3-7, ill. p. 5
Dore Ashton and Willem de Kooning, "Paintings by Willem de Kooning", Smith College Museum of Art, 1965, no. 28, ill. p. 33
Thomas B. Hess, "Willem de Kooning", New York: Museum of Modern Art & New York Graphic Society, 1968, p. 102, no. 71, and p. 143.
Novelene Ross, "Toward an American Identity: Selections from the Wichita Art Museum Collection of American Art", The Wichita Art Museum, 1998, p. 58.
Judith Zilczer, "A Way of Living: The Art of Willem de Kooning," Phaidon Press Limited/Phaidon Press, London/New York, 2014, p. 132, ill. p. 136.
Dulce M. Roman, "Monet and American Impressionism," Florida: University of Florida, 2015, fig. 1, plate 66, ill.
Bett Schumacher's written synopsis of the BMA/JHU Gallery Lecture on "Backyard on Tenth Street," presented in the public galleries at The Baltimore Museum of Art, June 3 and June 6, 1999.