Designer Analysis - Pollock, Jackson

Pollock, Jackson
Number 1A, 1948

Paul Jackson Pollock was born in 1912, an American painter, he became a major figure in the Abstract Expressionist movement. The movement was developed by American painters, mainly in New York, in the 1940s and 50s. The name suggests a rebellious, disordered, and lawless craze, a feeling you would expect from a post-war community. The focus of the art involved producing or expressing an emotional effect. Like surrealist concepts, expressionist felt art should come from the unconscious mind. There was two broad groups within the concept: action or colour-field. Action painters were spontaneously, improvising as they went along in an automatic, subconscious manner. The Colour-Field painters instead had interests in religion and myth, using simple compositions of colour in blocks in an attempt to engage the viewer as well as provoking a meditation response from the viewer, thoughtful and reflective.

Number 1A, 1948, created by Pollock is a large canvas smeared with paint, from drippings of paint in large dramatic brush strokes and sweeping marks. To do this he would pour and fling the paint, using sticks and knives. A childish action that is hard to control. This technique was enhanced by the scale, which requires a large input of an energetic application which would be hard for someone of inferior strength. it is this exertion that gives the finished effect it's energy, a buzz, an electricity of power that sits almost off the canvas. I feel if the initial input had been less aggressive the finish wouldn't be so kinetic. He also had to pouring paint direct from the can or trailing it from the brush or a stick to directly placed their inner impulses on the canvas.

He worked on the canvas either on the floor or tacked to a hard wall in order to freely move around it's edges. Removing the easel gave him freedom and changes the idea of a traditional perspective. It is this freedom of expression that was so relieving for the artists having been controlled for so long by war censorship.

Each stroke is individual, it can not be repeated or copied, and the nature of the painting means there is no mistakes. The page is infinite in respect of there being no beginning or end, instead a seemed endless overlaying of beauty.

Within the picture you can see -in order of the dominance- the following colours : pure black citric pale green turquoise, florescent highlighter orange, bleached white, melon red, deep dry blood red, and a chocolate brown. This eclectic mix sits on top of the background colour of a light antique brown that holds reference to an old piece of paper.