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Good, but not great
A retrospective of Lee Krasner's work over-inflates the significance of her contribution to 20th-century avant-garde painting, says CHRISTINE LINDEY
Self-Portrait, c. 1928 and Desert Moon, 1955

Lee Krasner: Living Colour
Barbican, London

THE CHILD of Russian immigrants to New York, Lee Krasner (1908-84) bucked the traditional expectations of her stultifyingly strict Orthodox Jewish upbringing, by announcing her decision to become an artist at the age of just 14.

Having persuaded her reluctant family, she studied in various prestigious New York art schools intermittently over many years.

Lee Krasner, Polar Stampede, 1960, Doris and Donald Fisher Collection, San Francisco MoMA © The Pollock-Krasner Foundation
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