Analysis reveals how ekphrasis illustrates grief in midcentury American art, highlighting influences of biography.
Abstract: “The Bay” blends Confessionalism and ekphrasis to explore the weight of grief through the lens of Helen Frankenthaler’s 1963 painting. Based on the events surrounding Frank O’Hara’s death as accounted in Cathy Curtis’s 2017 biography, A Generous Vision: The Creative Life of Elaine de Kooning, “Elaine and Frank” weaves personal experience with physical injury and mental health struggles into a dialogue with midcentury American art history.
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Jenny Molberg (2025) studied this question.
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