Saturday, March 21, 2009

Pollock, Ryder, Same Sky



This is "Going West" painted in the 1930s, when Pollock's work was influenced by the work of Albert Pinkham Ryder.



This is a seascape by Ryder.
There is a story about Ryder ending up half dead of starvation at his brother's New York hotel. His brother nurses him back to health, and serves him in the restaurant of the hotel, but Albert sits alone and is embarrassed.
Eventually he begins to eat in the back with the wait staff, all at one table. When word gets around that the hotel owner's brother eats with the help Albert's brother is mortified. He demands Albert eat in the restaurant.
Ryder would rather starve. So he goes back to the rathole from whence he came. Is that how you spell whence? Anyway, he goes home.
The thing is, look at the moon and the sky and the clouds. Is that what they look like to you? I've recently heard that Pollock's later pieces have fractal patterns from the Golden Mean. There is no way, knowing his style, that could have been planned, nothing in that style could have been planned. Look at these two pieces, every single brushstroke is a plan.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Your last paragraph is really strong!