The renegade artist, Jackson Pollock, embodied "abstract expressionism." His emotional outcries eventually found a place of rest on his canvas. His egotistical indifference to conventionality raised the eyebrow of the art community as his explosive temperament caused people to stop, gasp, listen, and wait until the full impact of his eruptions were acknowledged and absorbed.
The Jackson Pollock Art Documentary displays how the artist's psychological make-up screamed for attention and control. He was too large to express through ordinary artistic applications. Typical canvases, easels and paint brushes were pushed aside as he fervently demolished walls to accommodate his mammoth canvases. Colors flowed from paint tubes, splashed off of sticks and large brushes, and poured from paint cans as his body lyrically danced about his canvas, embellishing his spiritual blast with signature hand and footprints. Pollock gave birth to the subconscious outpouring of the soul on canvas - the abstracted inner man was born through Jackson Pollock who changed the face of art forever and took expression to a deeper, more personal, abstracted level.
Jackson's chaotic behavior and disregard for custom and congeniality would have caused him certain disgrace, but he was always buffeted by his brothers and the women in his life: his mother, his wife, his patron, and his mistress. It was his genius and drive that created works that astounded the art community; but it was the love of his wife and abstract artist, Lee Krasner, who kept him focused and provided a reclusive and (somewhat) alcohol-free environment in Long Island Springs. It was in his barn studio where Pollock first began to pour his feelings onto a canvas, and found a peace within himself that made form and shape of his own turbulent inner world.
Pollock's mastery rocked and shocked the art world, but those with an insight for innovation waved him on to greater heights. Sanctioned and supported by benefactress Peggy Guggenheim, he became known as the first abstract expressionist in American art, and was hailed by Life Magazine as perhaps the "greatest living painter in the United States." His style of painting, termed by art critic Harold Rosenberg as Action painting, was a new performance art where the artist becomes a part of the creation. Pollock brought America forward on the world stage of art and with his new voice proclaimed, "It doesn't make much difference how the paint is put on as long as something has been said. Technique is just a means of arriving at a statement."
Contained within the documentary is a radio interview with the artist, as well as contributions from Patsy Southgate, B.H. Friedman, Jerry Potter, Reuben Kadish, Elizabeth Pollock, Elaine DeKooning, Clement Greenber, Lee Krasner, Harry Cullum, William Rubin, Alfonso, Ossorio, and Ruth Kligman. Jackson Pollock bonus features include "Impressum," a text by Maria Walburga Sturzer and translated by Dr. Alexander Reynolds, which further illustrates the talent and innovation of the artist. The Picture Gallery includes 31 stills of Pollock's paintings and photographs with the Native American influenced painting, "Moon Woman, 1942;" and his massive lyrical "Mural, 1943;" as well as his tranquil "Lavender Mist, 1953." The Trailer includes mini-documentaries on the painters Johns, Oldenburg and Picasso.
I was inspired by Jackson Pollock, the artist, and also his creations that were purely subjective and unrelated to anything conventional. I was tantalized by his ability to take abstraction to its purest form. His works were as complicated as his life, but the overall affect (and that's what Pollock wanted you to take in, from border to border) was magnificent -- intimate, rhythmical with a quiet underlying sense of peace.
I do wish that English subtitles could be selected, but unfortunately, they are not an option.
