A controlled accident

By the time of Jackson Pollock's untimely death at the age of 44, he had shaken the art world to its core, creating controversial paintings using such media as commercial house paint, sand, and glass. Producing large-scale masterpieces that were impossible to duplicate, Pollock carved out his place in the history of both American painting and world art.

Despite his well-documented alcoholism, he managed to transcend his own internal limitations (call them demons if you will) to create art which itself transcended the limitations of formal painting and indeed, those of the canvas itself.

He was born in Cody, Wyoming in 1912. His father was distant, wanting little to do with his sons and often leaving them. His mother tried to compensate by spoiling him. Finally, it was virtually left to his older brothers to raise him. By the age of 16, he had made his way to Los Angeles with his brother Charles (who was also a painter) and was studying art. The brothers then lit out for New York, where Pollock met Thomas Hart Benton; who became a virtual surrogate father to him.

His mentors, teachers and influences were as diverse as his paintings - Benton of course (with his "essential rhythms of art"; who taught the "planar dynamics" of the European masters; and the use of swirling bold lines - and ironically who hated abstract art); Mexican muralists; Native American Art particularly its sand paintings; cave paintings (handprints used as proof of authorship); Ancient Egyptian symbolism; and Jungian psychoanalysis (Pollock had suffered a breakdown at 26).

He shared with other abstract expressionists, who were primarily based in New York, the theory of collective unconscious and primitive mythology facilitating the expression of their creativity with the physical process of painting. Surrealists including Picasso and Joan Miro also had an effect during his formative years (indeed, Miro's later works mirror an abstract expressionist sentiment); as did workshops with Siqueiros where Pollock adopted his "controlled accident" technique. And of course, one can't underestimate the assistance given to Pollock by Peggy Guggenheim.

Pollock's particular brand of the "controlled accident" style of painting involved the whole of his physical being; although he stated that "the final product was always subject to artistic will". He contended that he could "control the flow of the paint" and therefore "there is no accident". Pollock flung, splattered, poured and dripped paint over large expanses of raw canvas - choreography and chance, a painter's dance - calling upon the forces within, while embracing his influences. >>>

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