Lee Krasner

Rising Green, 1972. Lee Krasner. Oil on canvas. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Eugene Victor Thaw, 1983. © 2026 Pollock-Krasner Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
A key figure of Abstract Expressionism in the 1950s, Krasner continued to experiment in abstract styles throughout her career. Rising Green manifests the painter’s longstanding interest in nature-based imagery, its leaflike forms suggesting powerful vegetation. In Springs, near East Hampton, Long Island, she pursued a painterly engagement with nature on a large scale, working in the spacious converted barn used previously by her late husband Jackson Pollock, who died in 1956. The verdant shapes here are thrown into relief against a stark white ground, which, in turn, asserts its own role in the composition. The work’s elongated, arabesque forms recall the work of Henri Matisse, especially his late collages.