Profession: artist

As a young painter, Manet visited the aged Delacroix in his studio, Murger having told him at lunch that he’d find him a cold fish (he didn’t). He failed to get on with Courbet, met at the Brasserie Andler, but worked together with him, Daumier and Corot to have conservative Salon regulations changed. Morisot was a regular studio visitor, eventually marrying Manet’s brother. Among artists, Degas (met copying at the Louvre) and Monet were particularly close friends, Renoir another, while among writers, Zola, Mallarmé and Baudelaire all as friends championed him. Cézanne found his dandified appearance distasteful.

David was sent to the aged Boucher for instruction, who passed him on to Vien, with whom he studied in Paris and Rome. He met Mengs in Rome, who introduced him to Winckelmann’s ideas. Among his many students were Lund, Ingres, and Gros (he passed his Paris studio on to Gros when he exiled himself in Brussels, where Géricault, on his way back from England, met him); Paulze also studied with him, possibly in order to improve her drawing of scientific instruments, and may have provided the link between David and her husband Lavoisier (David painted a notable portrait of the two).

Greuze was a friend of her father’s; she learned from him, though perhaps not formally. She and Kauffman spent two days together, and though opposites, enjoyed each other’s company. Otherwise, significant acquaintanceships are difficult to demonstrate, partly because of the social niceties of the circles she moved in and her own métier as a society portraitist. So she called on Herschel (who showed her sun-spots), Martín y Soler called on her, and Reynolds paid her compliments; and she painted the teenage Byron, and Paisiello (in an apartment cold enough that they had to blow on their hands to stay warm).

Willem de Kooning and Kline were very close friends from the early 1940’s, swapping girlfriends and co-founding The Club; de Kooning prompted his stylistic breakthrough by suggesting he use a projector to enlarge small sketches to heroic scale. Close friends among writers included Kerouac and Creeley, and O’Hara, who organised a significant exhibition of Kline’s work. Teaching at Black Mountain, Wolpe and Kline formed a lasting relationship, while Twombly was among his students. Siskind and Feldman both dedicated work to him. He once ordered 12 scotch and sodas — 6 for him, 6 for Elaine de Kooning.

Hofmann taught her. She met Pollock, whom she ended up marrying, by going to his studio and asking to see his work when she didn’t recognise his name on a list of fellow-exhibitors. Mondrian, one of her influences, was met as a fellow-member of a New York abstractionist group. She illustrated O’Hara’s verse, while Motherwell translated from French for her. Both Hartigan (whom Krasner recommended for exhibitions) and Frankenthaler (a weekend visitor) became close friends; de Kooning, already a friend, became a Long Island neighbour (though Krasner and Elaine de Kooning never became close).

Guston was a high-school classmate. He studied under Benton, watched Orozco (an influence) paint with him, and was introduced to liquid-paint use by Siquieros. Matta’s promotion of psychic automatism was also influential. Krasner married him; Motherwell, Creeley and Kline were all friends; De Kooning, a drinking partner, loved his laconic way of telling Cedar Bar newcomers to fuck off. Tony Smith collaborated drunkenly in getting one of his best-known paintings started, though Newman denied adding in the Blue Poles of its title. Hofmann asked if he worked from nature: Pollock riposted that he was nature.

Guston knew Pollock from age fourteen (their school expelled them for challenging its policies). He briefly helped Siquieros in Mexico, followed Pollock to New York, and worked under Diller for the WPA. He met de Kooning and Davis at this time, learning about fearlessness with paint by watching Davis through a crack in the wall between their studios. He met Feldman (his closest friend) through Cage, and played out what Kline described as sibling rivalry with Pollock, including drunken fights. Rothko and Newman were other New York artist friends. Roth and he became close in the 1970’s, facing critical hostility.

Mitchell, Frankenthaler and Leslie were very close, as was O’Hara (she described the emotional intimacy with him as greater than any she had with a heterosexual). Pollock was a powerful early influence, and sent her on to de Kooning when she asked who else was making important work. Avery was the first significant artist she met, and through him her close friends Rothko and Gottlieb. She met Hofmann modelling for him, cashed in soda bottles so Kline could afford a subway fare, and drunk bourbon in Rothko’s studio as he confessed that he couldn’t let his ‘Four Seasons’ paintings go to a restaurant.

Neel’s psychologically-charged portraits only found approval late in her career. She said she painted the poet/curator O’Hara in the hope of currying favour (it didn’t work). She told Close, introduced in the street by a friend, that she hated his work (he replied that he admired hers). Frank and Leslie cast her in a film as the mother of a young bishop (Ginsberg, whom she painted, also featured). Many of her subjects (a young Robert Smithson, Aaron Copland, Virgil Thomson, Linus Pauling, many others) sat relatively briefly for her; ascribing a mutual connection is problematic. But Warhol, shown in full frailty, was a real friend.

Segal, Brecht, Dine and Grooms were met soon after Oldenburg arrived in New York. He first saw Kaprow at a picnic on Segal’s farm; Kaprow, Higgins, Whitman, Wesselman and Samaras were all involved by him in his performances. His association with all of these, and with others like Lichtenstein (met through Kaprow), was symptomatic of their mutual desire to develop work beyond the constraints of Abstract Expressionism. He worked informally for Antonioni in Rome, and visited Carl Breer in Detroit (he already knew Robert Breer). Gehry and Oldenburg, close colleagues, worked on various large-scale projects together.