Red Vertical Composition 5
1950
21 x 11 1/2 in. (53.3 x 29.2 cm)
Jackson Pollock
American
(Cody, WY, 1912 - 1956)
Object Type:
Painting
Medium and Support:
Oil on canvas
Credit Line:
Marion Stratton Gould Fund
Accession Number:
1959.11
Location: Currently on view
Jackson Pollock mused “that the modern painter cannot express this age, the airplane, the atom bomb, the radio, in the old forms of the Renaissance or of any other past culture. Each age finds its own technique.”
His “poured” paintings, like the one on view here, have become an emblem of twentieth-century abstract art. Eschewing traditional brushes, easels, and realistic subject matter, Pollock placed his canvases on the floor. He often walked on them as he dripped skeins of paint across their surfaces. Using the movement of his entire body, he got inside his paintings, as he sometimes described his working process. His painting style may appear to be accidental and random, but it was, in fact, controlled and defined.
[Summer 2015]