"Greenberg didn't like Frankenthaler's painting, but he did ask her out for a drink [c. 1950-51], and for the next five years, the pair underwent what she [Helen] described to me as 'a painting bath'. They went to every exhibition in town, from Pollock to Sir Alfred Munnings, the English horse painter (and an enemy of modernism). They'd get the catalogues to each show, and grade the paintings in them. [Helen: 'One check meant we liked it. Two checks was pretty good. Three was wow!' And always a lot of talk, about what made one painting more successful than another. [Helen:] 'This seems the opposite of that lofty beautiful experience that art is supposed to be', she recalled. [Helen: 'Every painting is supposed to be a valid expression and interesting. But the truth is some work and some don't. That happens with all painters in every age'. Greenberg had a great 'eye'; he could tell a first-rate painting from a second-rate one, but Frankenthaler wanted to make paintings that worked, so she looked and looked, seeking to develop her own eye."
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Quote of Piri Halasz, in 'Defying Categories: Helen Frankenthaler, 1928-2011', on Artcritical, Dec 2011
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Helen_Frankenthaler
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Helen Frankenthaler
Helen Frankenthaler (12 December 1928 – 28 December 2011) was an American post-painterly abstraction artist. Born in New York City, her work was influenced by Jackson Pollock, with whom she also was involved in the 1946–1960 abstract art movement.
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