Lately, I'd been seeing a lot of documentaries about the American Artist Jackson Pollack, and I certainly can't forget the restrospective of his work a few years ago at the Guggenheim Museum. Reminiscing on my life thus far, I conjured up the work and spirit of Jackson Pollack. I wondered how life must have been so challenging to him, not so much because of his internal torments, but because of what he had to endure from other people's gossip and exploitation of his work. It became quite clear early on in his career that Jackson Pollack had problems with alchoholism. Some people even think he had mental problems. It got me to thinking about how very few people had his back, that is, until he created works of art at a furious pace, and he became an art-world commodity. Suddenly finding himself the toast of the art world, vultures swarmed around him, just as they did the late Haitian-American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat...each vulture jockeying for a favorable position in his life, smiling and dancing while maligning him behind his back. I wondered how isolated Pollack must have felt, and how his greatest dances of escape were performed on canvas. Fortunately for Pollack he had a loving and supportive wife by his side in Lee Krasner. It could be argued that she was co-dependant, but what if it was just love?
Anyway, as I contemplated all this, I looked up at the sky and surrounding bare trees. I recognized immediately the beauty in simplicity, and quiet comtemplation. A solitary dance that only changed with the light, I began to see Pollacks canvases merge together from between the wood branches, preparing for a new birth of leaves, but reminding me altogether, that beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder.
The Ballad of An Infantile Dancer---inspired by the work and life of Jackson Pollack. Enjoy!
Number One by Ocean Morisset, 2009
Number One by Jackson Pollack, 1948
1 comment:
Only you can make dreary, winter branches beautiful and reflective, some even erotic. you never cease to amaze us!!!
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