Mukhammad 1

Mariam Mukhammad

Sandra Casserly

Art Appreciation 111

01 May 2017

Art Criticism of the New York School and the Works

After the destruction and awfulness that resulted after the second World War, many

artists began looking for a more unique style of art through which to express themselves.

Abstract Expressionism combined with color field to create what became known as the New

York School movement. This style was adopted by artists such as Mark Rothko, Barnett

Newman Willem de Kooning, Robert Motherwell. One of the most influential and famous artists

of the movement was Jackson Pollock, who began using a unique technique that became known

as drip painting. Pollocks works were unlike any of their time and to this day guide and shape

many modern works of art.

Jackson Pollock created many paintings using the drip technique but one of the most

famous was Number 30 called Autumn Rhythm. Pollock was known for using large canvases for

his drip paintings and Autumn Rhythm runs at 105 in by 207 in. The subtle paint covers a

tannish canvas in this piece. The colors used in the painting include light brown, white, black and

teal. Jackson Pollock poured and dripped paint on an unstretched canvas that laid on the floor as

he worked around it to create this work. His paintings were meant to be unlike anything

everyone had seen before and largely denied that traditional style of painting that was used in the

years before the New York School era. The different colors of paint are layered upon each other

and create fluid yet inconsistent lines and drips over a solid, muted background.
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When looking at Autumn Rhythm, the thing that is most noticeable is the harsh black

paint that covers the painting and overlaps most of the other colors. The boldness of the black

drips almost seem to suck the audience into the painting. However, the color that stands out the

most is the teal and it is obvious among the other neutral and basic colors that engulf most of the

canvas. Since Pollock used any suitable paint he could find to create his pieces, the dried paint

on top of the canvas creates and uneven and slightly protruded texture. Because the each stroke

is uniquely dripped unto every part of the painting, the composition is left asymmetrical.

However, balance is created by Pollock within the painting through use of each color throughout

all of the long canvas. When looking at the work, the eyes of an observer move throughout the

painting almost following the free-flowing strokes of paint on the canvas. Another unique

element of the painting is how parts of the canvas are left blank and exposed both around and

within the composition.

The New York School style of painting for most part is not meant to show any specific

thing like traditional paintings but rather focus on the act of creating the art. According to a

description article for the Met Museum about Autumn Rhythm, Although Pollock's imagery is

nonrepresentational, Autumn Rhythm is evocative of nature, not only in its title but also in its

coloring, horizontal orientation, and sense of ground and space. Pollocks paintings do not force

an observer to see specifics in a way that theyre used to seeing them. Instead, Jackson Pollocks

works allow oneself to get lost in the composition and find their own meaning within it. The

artists diverse and almost chaotic painting process tends to create lyrical, often spiritual, works

of art that are distinct from anything created to this day.

When looking at Autumn Rhythm and any of Jackson Pollocks compositions, the

personal reaction that is drawn from them is beauty and intrigue within the chaos. The black that
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is consistently used to layer over most of Pollocks works, reveals an almost kind darkness that

somehow makes the paintings more inviting yet anarchic. It is incredible how Pollocks paintings

although meant to be very much non-representational seem to tell a unique story to their

onlooker. According to Jackson Pollock, My painting does not come from the easel. I hardly

ever stretch my canvas before painting. I prefer to tack the unstretched canvas to the hard wall or

the floor. I need the resistance of a hard surface. On the floor I am more at ease. I feel nearer,

more a part of the painting, since this way I can walk around it, work from the four sides and

literally be in the painting. Each of Pollocks paintings reveal a personal connection to the

painter in the way that they are created and the way that he seems to use his whole body in the

process of their creation. Jackson Pollock creates his works from different angles as he drips the

paint across the large canvas which makes it remarkably unrepeatable and one of a kind.
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Works Cited

Preble, Duane, Patrick Frank, and Sarah Preble. Artforms: An Introduction to the Visual Arts.

New York: Longman, 2000. Print.

"Autumn Rhythm (Number 30) | Jackson Pollock | 57.92 | Work of Art | Heilbrunn Timeline of

Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art." The Met's Heilbrunn Timeline of Art

History. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 May 2017. <http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-

art/57.92/>.

"Jackson Pollock." University of Iowa Museum of Art. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 May 2017.

<https://uima.uiowa.edu/collections/american-art-1900-1980/jackson-pollock/jackson-

pollock/>.