Abstract Artist Jackson Pollack

Jackson Pollack was born in Cody, Wyoming on January 28, 1912. He grew up in Arizona and California, and was exposed to Indian culture through his father. In 1929, he moved to New York City and began painting under his mentor Thomas Hart Benton at the Arts Student League. Benton exposed Pollack to working with the Regionalists, and introducing his to Mexican mural painters like David Alfaro Siqueiros, Clemente Orozco, and Diego Rivera.

From 1938 to 1942, Pollack began working with the Federal Art Project. This was a visual arts arm of the Great Depression era New Deal WPA (Work Projects Administration) Federal One Program. He worked in a federally funded program that gave unemployed artists work to paint non-government buildings and hospitals.

He was introduced to the drip method when he met Siqueiros in 1936 at an experimental workshop in New York City. The liquid paints technique was how he created his pieces and it became some of his most famous works. His most famous pieces includes 'Male and Female,' in which he used paint pouring as a way to create some of his most famous pieces.

He would poke holes out of the bottom of the cans to get an extended dripping pattern. Instead of an upright position of the canvas, he managed to position his canvas in all angles to apply the paint from all directions, further expanding how he was able to paint.

His dripping style was expanded into different movement patterns that he incorporated into his future works. He drew inspiration from an Indian sand-painting demonstration that he saw, and worked those ideas into his works. Pollack had a specific way that he mixed his paints and got it ready to begin painting. Once he was ready, he had specific movements that inspired how the painting would gradually evolve into.

He later shifted from the drip method to experimenting with different ideas such as black on unprimed canvases and later returning to using color and figurative elements. His more conventional style of painting drew more mainstream appeal than his most famous pieces from the drip era. It was well documented that this did not sit well with Pollack and began an increased deterioration of his personal side.

He died on August 11, 1956 in a car crash in Springs, New York. His estate has since been run by a non-profit organization through State University in New York at Stony Brook.

Mark Traston is an associate with Portrait Painting. The company specializes in turning a photo to painting. Each portrait artist specializes in a specific area including wedding paintings, pet portraits, and executive portraits

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