Interchange

Willem de Kooning rendered this Interchange in 1955, marking a key shift in his career from figurative studies to pure Abstract Expressionism. The 79 by 69-inch canvas features interlocking shapes in flesh tones, yellows, and blues, with a fleshy pink mass at center suggesting a seated female figure. De Kooning worked with thick impasto layers, mixing commercial enamel paints with traditional oils to create glossy passages contrasting with matte sections.

His technique involved broad charcoal underdrawings, aggressive overpainting with wide brushes and palette knives, then scraping back to rework areas. This physical approach to painting positioned de Kooning alongside Jackson Pollock and Franz Kline as leaders of the gestural abstraction movement. The composition hovers between recognizable forms and pure abstraction, a tension that defined his mature style.

Architect Edgar Kaufmann Jr. purchased Interchange from Sidney Janis Gallery in 1955 for $4,000. Sixty years later, hedge fund manager Kenneth C. Griffin acquired it privately for $300 million, setting the record for the highest price paid for a 20th-century painting. The work now hangs at the Art Institute of Chicago.