#32: Mary Gabriel is an American author and biographer whose books include Love and Capital: Karl and Jenny Marx and the Birth of a Revolution, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. She worked in Washington and London as a Reuters editor for nearly two decades and currently lives in Ireland.

Her book Ninth Street Women is a deep exploration of the mid-20th century Abstract Expressionist in New York City. Ninth Street Women is a chronicle of not just one — but five American women artists: Lee Krasner (wife of Jackson Pollock), Elaine De Kooning (wife of Willem de Kooning), Grace Hartigan, Joan Mitchell and Helen Frankenthaler.

I spoke with Mary Gabriel about her work habits and the era when non-representational abstract painting came of age in the wake of world war, nuclear weapons and a changing America.