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Pollock, Jackson (P)

JACKSON POLLOCK

Pasiphae
1943
Oil on canvas
56 x 96

Autumn Rhythm
1950
Oil on unsized canvas
105 x 207

Search
1955
Oil on canvas
57 1/2 x 90

Janis Gallery
Nov.28-Dec.31,1955

"Jackson Pollock is probably the most famous or notorious, according to individual opinion, American Modernist...  
How he got that way is re-enacted in a review of eighteen years of his work (1937-55) at the Janis Gallery. In these revolutionary paintings are demonstrated his progressive abandonment of forethought; the way he leaves things to chance, the ruthless steps he has taken to shatter the conventions of art and introduce, for the first time in art, raw and naked, the elemental and largely subconscious promptings of his creative nature."

S.P. N.Y. Times, Dec. 4, 1956

"more than any other living artists's, Pollock's work has become a shibboleth: I have heard the question 'What d'you think of Jackson Pollock?' shouted from the floor of a public gathering in a tone of 'Are you with us or against us?'.... The effect of this exhibition is utterly overwhelming. Questions as to the validity of Pollock's work, though they remain perfectly good in theory are simply blasted out of relevance by the manifestations of Herculean effort, this evidence of mortal struggle between the man and his art. For the man mortifies his skill in dogged quest for something other than accomplishment. From the first to last the artist tramples on his own facility and spurns the elegance that creeps into a style which he has practiced to the point of knowing how...."

L.H. Arts , Dec., 1955

Reviews of Current Show:
Arts News, Vol.54(Dec., 1955), 53
Arts, Vol.30(Dec.1955), 43,44
N.Y. Herald Tribune, Dec. 4, 1955
N.Y. Times, Dec. 4, 1955

Suggested References:
Fifteen Americans. Museum of Modern Art. Catalog, 1952
Goodough, R., "Pollock Paints a Picture," Art News, Vol. 50(May,1951), 36-41, 60-1
Greenberg, C., "'American-type' Painting", Partisan Ewview, Vol.22,(Spring, 1955), 179-196
Pollock, Jackson, "My Painting", Possibilities, Winter '47-48, pp. 78-83
Ritchie, A.C. Abstract Painting and Sculpture in America. New York, Museum of Modern Art, 1951, 159 pp.
Soby, J.T. Contemporary Painting. New York: Museum of Modern Art, 151pp. 

Biographical Note:
Jackson Pollock was born in Cody, Wyoming, in [[?]]. He came to N.Y. in 1929 and studied with Thomas Hart Benton ('29-30). After he studied with Hofmann. From 1938 to '42, he worked on the WPA art project. His first one-man show was at the Art of This Century Museum in 1942, an exhibition described in one review as "explosive". Following this show he had three more in successive years at the same gallery. In 1949 and again in 1951, he showed at the Betty Parsons Gallery. And in '51 the Arts Club in Chicago showed his work for the second time, an earlier exhibition having taken place in '45 in which year he also had a one-man at the San Francisco Museum. Pollock's work was shown in '52 in one-mans at the Janis Gallery and at Bennington College which in the following year a show was arranged at Williams College. Solo exhibitions of his work have been seen abroad at the Biennale in Venic ('50), the Sala Napoleonica, Venice, the same year: at the Studio Fachetti, Paris, '52; and at the Kunsthaus, Zurich, '53. Later exhibitions have been held at the Janis Gallery, 1954 and '55. His work has been collected in this country by many private individuals and can be seen in many public museums such as the Addison Gallery, the Phillips Academy, the Baltimore, Brooklyn, and the Metropolitan, etc. Pollock lives in East Hampton, L.I., N.Y.