Philip Guston (1913–1980), Abstraction, 1957. Oil on paper mounted on board, 24 1/2 x 35 1/2 in. (62.2 x 90.2 cm). Grey Art Gallery, New York University Art Collection. Gift of Guy Weill, 1966.41. © Estate of Philip Guston. Courtesy McKee Gallery

Born in Montreal, Guston attended high school in Los Angeles, where he befriended Jackson Pollock. At an age when the latter displayed little more than a talent for teenage rebellion, Guston was already a fine draughtsman. (He later taught a freshman drawing class at New York University.)

Following a sojourn in Italy, Guston adopted a mode of gestural abstract painting—dubbed Abstract Impressionism—in which blurry planes and shapes float in a field of crosshatched brushstrokes. At first glance Guston’s mid-career abstractions, such as this one, appear somewhat pastoral, but in retrospect they reveal an anxiety that emerges, full throttle, in his late, cartoon-like depictions of hooded Klansmen, bare light bulbs, cyclopean eyes, and dispossessed shoes.