Jackson Pollock has been called by many one of the most important artists of the twentieth century. There are also many out there that call him simply lucky because the world was open to his style of painting at the time. Then there are those who believe he is a fraud and he merely exposed how gullible the world can be, especially in the art communities.
Love his work or hate it, Jackson Pollock certainly sparked conversation and his work is still revered by many today. In fact, his paintings sell for millions today. In 2016, Number 16 (one of his more gamed works) went for $32 645 000 at an auction held at Christie’s in New York.
This work is only 22 ¼ inches by 30 ¾ inches, and is simply a piece of paper covered in enamel paint spatters. However, those spatters were masterfully placed there by someone who changed the art world forever.
Expression Over Form
Jackson Pollock’s work is wild, expressive and unlike anything that was considered good by art critics and theorists up until that point. Pollock inspired an entirely new movement, along with other artists at the time such as Mark Rothko.
They moved away from the idea of form and traditional lines in paintings. Their work became about expressing emotions, thoughts and ideas in a visual, sensual way. What they created seemed more raw and more real than anything else being painted up until this point.
This artistic expression was something that Pollock apparently fought with and for his entire life. He spent his days looking for a way to get the emotions that raged within him out into the world.
This could not be achieved in traditional forms of painting, so he had to invent his own. In doing so, he became a forerunner of the Abstract Expressionism movement that took over the World War II period.
The Rise Of The Media And A Short Life
Part of what made Pollock so famous and why so many are fascinated with his work is the mythology that was created around him. He rose to prominence at a time when the world was looking at America in a different light, long before NZ betting sites emerged. The artistic movement that he was leading in America seemed to vanquish the older, stuffier dominance of culture that came from Europe.
At the same time, World War II had America firmly in the limelight of the media as the heroes of the world. Pollock was now living in New York City, a place that was seen as the capital of culture in the world at the time.
Pollock then died rather suddenly and quite young in 1956. He was only 44 years old and he died in a tragic car crash. All of this added to the myth and the legend, and created an air of finality to his body of work. Suddenly, his pieces became more and more sought after, and the prices started to rise as the supply dried up.