'Pink Angels' features pink- and coral-colored, biomorphic shapes that float above a background of mustard yellows and golds, representing an important stage in de Kooning's transition from figuration to abstraction in the late 1940s. The fleshy pink shapes suggest anatomical forms that have been ripped apart or are in the process of colliding, perhaps influenced by the trauma of World War II. Curator John Elderfield notes that the painting also shows connections to the works of Picasso, Miró, Matisse, and Pieter Bruegel the Elder, especially Picasso's 'Guernica'.

What sets de Kooning's approach apart is his resistance to hiding the process of the painting's creation. Charcoal lines outline the pink forms and intersect the golden areas, and discernible shapes like an eye and a fish head in the bottom left corner, a circle and rectangle in the bottom center, and a crab-like form in the bottom right are visible. De Kooning used tracings to position and rearrange shapes on the canvas, allowing for fluid construction and reconstruction of his compositions. This method gives his works a sense of spontaneity despite the careful planning and manipulation behind the scenes. Unlike many of his contemporaries, who claimed to work spontaneously without sketches, de Kooning's technique results in complex layering and sudden, shifting dissonances on the painting's surface.