He began his career as an artist during the depression years and worked
for the Federal Arts Project in New York from 1938 to 1942. Pollock's
early painting was expressionistically realistic and then surrealistic
in style. However, by the early 1940's his work had become completely
abstract expressionist in character with no figuration at all. This
was an expression of the isolation of the painter in the modern world:
painting itself is the subject matter of these works, a concept that
must be accepted by the viewer before he can begin to understand or
appreciate this highly intellectual form of art. In 1951-52 Pollock
reintroduced the semblance of anatomical imagery into his abstract
work.
Pollock's art was a violent, romantic revolt in which the artist
himself was irrevocably involved, for he was completely committed
to the act of painting in itself, to the possibilities inherent in
paint, and to the results of the interactions between himself and
his medium. When he flung his paint at the canvas, he energetically
directed it, fought with it, and either won or lost the battle. The
result is a painting that moves dynamically in all directions, from
the inner to the outer surface. A freedom of expression resulted that
revolutionized mid-twentieth-century art both in the United States
and in Europe, creating a new expansion and a new impetus for the
solution, through art, of modern man's struggle in the modern world.
Pollock's career was tragically cut short by his death in an automobile
accident.
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