Joan Mitchell (1925–1992) was an American abstract expressionist painter and printmaker, known for her large-scale works and vital role in the second generation of Abstract Expressionists.
Joan Mitchell painted City Landscape in 1955. She was way ahead of her time as an American abstract expressionist painter—at the time she was called mad or crazy even—but she is now recognised as one of the most important women painters of our time. She was totally on her own journey with abstract expressionism, never quite fitting the mould, always pushing further. Dynamic, dramatic, intuitive, and absolutely committed to her vision.
She was a big influence on me as an art student. Why? Because she was the first to do crazy things with paint—to really do things with it, to make it move and sing and shout. To be an intuitive painter, you have to let go of all your preconceived ideas of art and then control the abstract into subject.
It's that fine line between letting go and relating to a subject that makes painting so thrilling and so difficult. Joan Mitchell walked that line better than almost anyone. She always went more abstract—very abstract by the end of her time on earth—but you can always feel the landscape, the memory, the emotion underneath. I loved her.
MY FAVOURITE PIECE
City Landscape (1955)
Oil on linen, 203.2 × 203.2 cm (80 × 80 in)
Art Institute of Chicago
