New Book Offers Insight on American Abstract Expressionist Clyfford Still

Clyfford Still is considered by many the most daring and original of the American Abstract Expressionist painters.

He was one of the first to develop a monumentally scaled abstract style without a recognizable subject. Yet, among his renowned peers, who include Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning, and Barnett Newman, Still remains the least examined major figure. Still severed ties with the commercial art establishment in the early 1950s, and at the time of his death in 1980, his estate comprised some 3,412 artworks—including more than 800 paintings—that were all but unknown to the art world. Susan F. Lake and Barbara A. Ramsay were granted access to this collection by the estate and by the Clyfford Still Museum in Denver, which houses this immense corpus today.

Clyfford Still (Getty Conservation Institute, $40) is based on the authors’ materials research and enriched by their unprecedented access to Still’s artworks, paints, correspondence, studio records, and personal library. The book provides the first detailed account of his materials, working methods, and techniques. Initial chapters present an engaging and erudite overview of the artist's life. Subsequent chapters trace the development of his visionary style, offer in-depth materials analysis of selected works from each decade of his career, and suggest new approaches to the care and conservation of his paintings. There is also a series of technical appendices as well as a full bibliography.