Attributed to Corinne Michelle West, no coa, private collection, medium: oil measurements:25"WX30"H framed, good condition Biography: Corinne Michelle West was an American painter; she also used the names Mikael and Michael West. She was an Abstract Expressionist. She is considered one of the pioneers of Abstract Expressionism, a style commonly associated with Willem de Kooning and the Action Paintings of Jackson Pollock. Inspired by Parisian philosopher Henri Bergson’s theory of “living energy” and the new spirituality to come out of post-war American art, West adopted a style that can be described as Neo-Cubist, using heavy painterly brushstrokes to bring movement to the canvas. In an essay from January 1946, she says, “The new peace has brought about a world of opening facts — and a speed which causes change both of matter and a way of doing things — a different system — the world by the artist is sudden viewed and felt in a new way." In 1946, after returning to New York from Rochester, she exhibited at the Pinacotheca Gallery alongside Mark Rothko and Adolph Gottlieb. West – on June 30, 1948, in Manhattan – married filmmaker Francis Lee; they divorced in 1960.