Through the 1940’s and 1960’s Fried and Greenberg established the idea of the “all over” and “the optical” pertaining to Jackson Pollock’s artwork. In Pollock’s painting, Number 32, evidence of the “all over” can be seen through Pollock’s technique of throwing, dripping and even stepping all over the canvas as he creates a composition that engulfs the entire canvas. Greenberg describes “the all over” as an overwhelming sense of “sheer texture, and sheer sensation that only the eye perceives.” Looking at the full painting of Number 32, there is no focal point, no sense of movement and direction for the viewer to keep track of. The viewer is taken throughout the whole entire painting all at once. In all its parts, Pollock creates not a single
Jackson Pollock was not known for painting images, that's because he didn't use a brush He believed the brush would interfere with the dripping of the paint. Instead Jackson used a stick to pour paint onto the canvas. He would change the color, type of paint, and the thickness of the paint as the work progressed. Therefore, the painting would reflect the movements of his arm and body as he applied the paint. The activity of the painting would become part of the painting itself. That style of painting is called action painting. Jackson Pollock was the first "all-over" action painted just like Cernuschi stated on page 67 in his book Meaning and Significance, "He painted no image, just action." It looked like Pollock almost imitated a dance. Pollock dripped paint all over the canvas, but always had total control of where the splash of paint would be. That is how he got his nickname "Jack the
Jackson Pollock was a legendary, novel, abstract expressionist who has created numerous paintings through his drip-style, action painting technique (Goodnough, 2012). Theosophical influence arose from Phillip Guston and Thomas Hart Benton, while in the early stages of the artist’s life. Muralists, such as Jose Clemente Orozco and Diego Rivera were also admired and studied by Pollock. He was captivated by the unorthodox techniques of David Alfaro Siqueiros which contributed to the abstract style of Jackson Pollock (Solomon, 1987).
When Pollock was witnessed painting, people would refer to him as ‘dancing across the canvas’. Each painting was like a dance routine and he let the painting guide his hand around and around in circles until it was completed. Pollock did not like for his audience to be able to identify any trace of academic artistic quality. He was even notorious for signing his paintings by pressing the palm of his hand down onto the wet paint. It was efficient for him, especially since in his ‘drip’ paintings he would never lift a brush. What this did to his work then was no longer did he display a replica of a scene or person like most landscape and portrait artists, but instead he displayed his fluent motion.
Marcel Duchamp stated that "It was his achievement to treat the camera as he treated the paintbrush, as a mere instrument at the service of the mind” (Biography.com, 2017). In addition, the photogram might seem expressive and abstract, yet on the contrary, it is the precise medium to document the everyday objects in an unrepeatable and somehow uncontrollable way. The artist cannot predict how the selected objects will be recorded under the light sources that were tampered with. From the first glance, the image completely dissociated from its original subject, allowing one’s memory to fill the gap. Yet below its surface, the image is an accurate documentation that captured a moment of psychical intensity. It revealed a new visual experience, using objects in the simplest way. One can say that the use of this medium disclosed reality more preciously due to its invisibility and mysterious representation (The Museum of Modern Art, 2017).
When you look at the two paintings; “The Starry Night” by Vincent Van Gogh, and “Number 1 1949” by Jackson Pollock; there are a few similarities about the meaning of the works of art. Their background and history are different. These paintings were created in two totally different eras and have different formal and technical aspects. Saying that, these works of art share no spiritual or moral value. Respectively these paintings have a great history and legacy. Two paintings created in different time periods have little in common but yet so much in common.
His personal technique in gesture and action painting was applied as directly as possible. Pollock said that through this active process, he could "literally be in the painting". This describes the term coined "action painting". He also said, "When I am in my painting, I'm not aware of what I'm doing. It is only after a sort of get acquainted' period that I see what I have been about. I have no fears about making
David Lynch's Blue Velvet is an exploration of things above and below the surface. This surface is really a borderline between not only idyllic suburban America and the dark, perverted corruption that lies underneath but also between good and evil, conscious and subconscious, dream and reality. Although this division seems quite rigid and clean-cut some of the most important implications of the film stem from the transgressions of these borderlines. In the initial scenes of the film Lynch introduces Lumberton, the typical small town in Middle America where the fireman waves at you, the children are well protected, the lawns are green and there is a smile on everybody's face. Naturally, the most important clich?
Aggressive and harsh, raw in colour, the texture thick and heavy as if it had been relentlessly worked and re-worked over again and again. Pictures don't have the delicacy of Pollock's. Shapes are vaguely suggestive , pressed together, brush strokes are dense
Taking following extreme cases of abstraction, when speaking of Pollock’s work such as his ”Autumn Rhythm” (1950), we realize how the visual formed is fully based on science and gravity that permits the dripping and pouring of the paint on the horizontal canvas. But, by walking around/on the canvas we can argue Greenberg’s analysis and suppose that the painter possibly connects with it, he gets drowned in the act and merges inside the painting while mechanically pouring paint on the canvas. This means that even though the painter tries to focus on the flatness of the painting rather than the content and is physically detached from the canvas, this focus cannot erase an emotional
White Light has numerous colors and one can estimate that there are seven colors seen with the naked eye red, yellow, blue, green, grey, white, and black, although tint and shade vary, some of the colors are darker or lighter in value due to the fact that they have been blended into one another. Determining the colors requires a person to look not only on the surface but analyze each layer to arrive at a conclusion of color usage. Pollock dripped paint onto the canvas straight from the tubes which the originated from. Those tubes were also used to create soft peaks and layers to make the artists’ work texturally as intriguing as the color choices. He also used a stick instead of a paintbrush to cast the mediums onto the canvas. Another interesting fact is that Pollock painted with his canvas on the floor to feel a direct connection with his art.
The use of geometric shapes in this painting allows the subject to be viewed in both a recognizable and unrecognizable state at the same time. Overall, geometric shapes and patterns play an essential role in what the viewer sees, which is further supported by a powerful color palate.
In 1953, Robert Rauschenberg had the idea of adding drawing to his All White Series. However, drawing on these paintings, or anywhere, would defeat the purpose of this series, and so he came to the conclusion that the only way he could achieve this would be through erasure. He began experimenting with his own drawings, but still being a young artist it he didn’t think it would be considered art. For his idea to work, he thought, it had to be art that he erased. Having admiration and respect for artist Willem de Kooning, Rauschenberg decided to buy a bottle of Jack Daniels, and go to his house. Rauschenberg explained to de Kooning his idea, and asked if he could use a drawing of his. Reluctant, de Kooning agreed, only because he understood the idea. After looking through his portfolios, de Kooning handed Rauschenberg a drawing that he would miss, and that was almost impossible to erase. A month later, Rauschenberg successfully erased de Kooning’s drawing, and with the help of Jasper Johns, titled the piece in ink, and framed it. Robert Rauschenberg’s Erased de Kooning Drawing can be seen as either a minimalist piece or conceptual piece. Through a clearer understanding of both movements, the aim of this essay is to show how this piece could be seen as a minimal piece or a conceptual piece, and to see which movement it leans more towards.
This implies that painting, rather than 'using art to conceal art' (ibid) by creating illusionistic space and depth, should rather use art 'to call attention to art' (ibid), that is, to emphasise the unique characteristics of the medium; 'the flat surface, the shape of the support, the properties of pigment' (ibid). Greenberg states that such a process would render art 'pure', that is, autonomous, free of any extraneous elements deriving from other arts, such as theatricality or narrative. The impact of a painting should thus derive from those technical aspects characteristic of painting, such as colour, form and composition. An example of the sort of painting Greenberg was advocating at the time may clarify this. Morris Louis's painting Alpha-Phi (pl.D10) is exactly contemporary with the publication of 'Modernist Painting'. It consists of bold, ragged, diagonal streaks of pure colour against an off-white ground; Louis's use of acrylic paints, which soak into the canvas, means that the colours appear integrated with the ground and hence do not disrupt the flatness of the picture plane. Its effect depends upon the arrangement of colours and the large scale of the painting which makes it occupy 'so much of one's visual field that it loses its character as a discrete tactile object and thereby become that much more purely a picture, a strictly visual entity' (Greenberg, 'Louis and Noland', p.28). It is apparently devoid of references to
Modernism has found new expressions in art which in turn have changed how people critic and understand art, in this essay I am going to focus more on abstract expressionism. Debates in this movement have gone as far as influencing many artists and the two well-known critics who have made this movement more remarkable and have changed the art world completely are Clement Greenberg and Ronald Rosenberg. On the writings of these two gentlemen about art I will try to draw out the differences in the idea of what abstract expressionism is and what it is supposed to be, compare and outline the similarities and the differences between the two critics.
In a ‘tradition breaking spirit’ [D’Alleva, 2012], that characterised modernist artists, early in the twentieth century, Duchamp abandoned traditional ideas and techniques, to create a new kind of ‘art’, one that the idea behind a work of art is more important that its visual realization, the ‘retinal’. The ready-mades was the product of Duchamp’s questioning what art is.