In 1952, at the age of 23, Helen Frankenthaler painted Mountains and Sea, the picture that would launch her career.  She innovated by using a new technique; stain painting, with thin washes directly on the unprimed canvas.

 

After she painted it, her then lover, art critic Clement Greenberg arrived at the studio, and she asked the questions she would continue to ask herself: "Is it finished? Is it a complete picture?". Eventually she decided that it was, and she dated it "10/26/52"

 

She had a big influence on Kenneth Noland and Morris Louis, who called her “a bridge between Pollock and what was possible.”

 

Sources:

Helen Frankenthaler: a paintings retrospective E.A. Carmean, Jr