Franz Kline was an American painter, associated with the Abstract Expressionist movement and the informal group, the New York School, which was comprised of downtown painters like Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Robert Motherwell, John Ferren, Lee Krasner as well as local poets and musicians; Kline and de Kooning reportedly leading the group.
Beginning in the 1940s Kline abandoned representationalism and moved into abstraction, generalizing his figurative subjects into lines which fit together. Over time, this evolved into what became known as "pure abstraction:" not geometrical, not decorative, no “subject matter” for the artist, no dreams, no Jungian monsters like children’s doodlings. His signature style became black and white, which distinguished him and became liberation, a “break for freedom” that reportedly effected everyone in the New York School group in 1950.