Who was the painter Paul Jenkins?
Paul Jenkins was an American abstract painter who lived between Paris and New York. After studying at the Art Students League, he became part of the Abstract Expressionist movement with Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko. Paul Jenkins also worked with many French artists, as well as Japanese artists in the Gutai group.
The artist Paul Jenkins was born on 12 July 1923 in Kansas City, Missouri, in the United States. Paul Jenkins studied at the Kansas City Art Institute between 1937 and 1942, and then at the Art Students League of New York between 1948 and 1953. It was at the latter that he met the painters Morris Kantor and Mark Rothko. After graduating, Jenkins had the opportunity to travel using the benefits he received as a result of the G.I. Bill—a scholarship distributed by the U.S. government to encourage cultural exchange between the United States and Europe. This enabled the artist to travel to Italy and Spain before moving to Paris. In the French capital, Jenkins met the artists Jean Dubuffet, Georges Mathieu and Pierre Soulages, as well as various American artists living in Paris, including the painters Sam Francis and Lee Krasner. The artist divided his time between New York and Paris throughout his life.
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