Alfred Cohen: An American Artist in Europe - Between Figuration and Abstraction

In London Cohen found a studio close to World's End in Chelsea. He recalled 'one morning I walked out and saw the light on the river and the houseboats and I knew that's what I had to paint'. He later described this series of large Thames canvases as 'impressionistic - watery, Turneresque, suffused with light'. But contemporary reviewers were struck by their more contemporary elements: 'Look […] at almost any few square inches of a Cohen canvas and you have a little gem of abstract painting' (the Tatler); Anita Brookner also admired his work, describing it as 'abstract impressionist'.