Panel Discussion: Curators on Exhibiting de Kooning

John Elderfield, Mitra Abbaspour, and Lee Colón, the curatorial team behind Willem de Kooning: The Breakthrough Years, 1945–50, present their research and discuss the process of selecting and borrowing works for the exhibition. Introduced by James Steward, the Museum’s Nancy A. Nasher–David J. Haemisegger, Class of 1976, Director. Presentations will be followed by a Q&A with AnnMarie Perl, research scholar and lecturer in the Department of Art & Archaeology.

Captions are computer generated.

Organized by the Princeton University Art Museum, the exhibition is cocurated by John Elderfield, the Museum’s inaugural Allen R. Adler, Class of 1967, Distinguished Curator and Lecturer (2015–19) and Chief Curator Emeritus of Painting and Sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, New York; and Mitra Abbaspour, Houghton Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art and head, Division of Modern and Contemporary Art, Harvard Art Museums; with Lee Colón, curatorial research associate, Princeton University Art Museum.  

The Princeton University Art Museum’s Art Talks: Willem de Kooning are made possible by a gift from Lisa Beth Podos ’86 made in honor of Shirley Ann and Frank Wozencraft and Family.

All artworks by Willem de Kooning © 2026 The Willem de Kooning Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York