Altoon Sultan blogs about the MoMA de Kooning retrospective, focusing on the early career paintings before 1950.  

Writing about Father, Mother, Sister, Brother, c. 1937, Sultan remarks: "I am struck by the pure grace of this image, and find myself thinking of Indian miniatures, which also have flat areas of gorgeous color bounded by sensitive line; also of Matisse, and of course Arshile Gorky, a friend and great influence. The paint is alive, the surface doesn't sit still, the figure is lost and found and lost again."