Untitled #15

De Kooning's working methods blurred the boundaries between drawing and painting, composition and collage. The artist routinely worked on several pieces at once, from several different angles, to achieve the desired final effect. Paintings, when examined closely, reveal drip marks in opposite directions and drawings show bold gestural strokes that converge from many directions. Furthermore, de Kooning often placed drawings on top of other drawings and paintings, layering his images, while other works realized a compositional cohesiveness by themselves. Untitled #15 is a strong example of de Kooning's dynamic draftsmanship of the late 1950s. The work's composition is emboldened by the untraditional sheet format and it seems evident that the artist has worked the sheet from several orientations to explore his subject.