A biography of five women painters who revolutionized American modern art, from National Book Award finalist Mary Gabriel.

NINTH STREET WOMEN is the impassioned, wild, alternately tragic and exhilarating story of five women, Lee Krasner, Elaine de Kooning, Grace Hartigan, Joan Mitchell, and Helen Frankenthaler, who dared to enter the macho world of mid-20th century abstract painting not as muses, but as artists. From their cold-water lofts, where they painted, drank, fought, and loved, these pioneers burst open the door to the art world for themselves and all female artists to come.

Despite being broke and ostracized by much of the official art world, these women changed American art and society, tearing up the governing social code and replacing it with a doctrine of liberation. NINTH STREET WOMEN tells a remarkable and inspiring story of the power of art and artists against the backdrop of a post-war America that would never be the same again.