11/17/18

I'm Faith Lapidus. And I'm Bob Doughty with People in America in VOA Special English. Today, we tell about the famous artist Jackson Pollock who helped redefine modern art in the United States.

Pollock invented a new kind of painting that changed the way the world looked at art. Until the twentieth century, most paintings were representational. This means that artists represented their subjects in a way that was realistic and recognizable.

However, during the first half of the twentieth century, artists like Jackson Pollock started to explore other methods of representation. When he first began painting, Jackson Pollock painted representational objects such as people and animals.

However, he is famous for helping to create a whole new art movement called Abstract Expressionism. An abstract image is one where the subject is not represented realistically. Instead, the artist uses color and shapes to suggest the most general qualities of the subject.

Expressionism is a kind of art that expresses feelings and thoughts. Abstract Expressionism is art that shows emotions and ideas through non-representational forms. In Pollock's most famous works, there is no recognizable subject. His art works are large surfaces of canvas completely covered in different colors of paint.

However, Pollock did not start out as a revolutionary painter. He developed the artistic process he became famous for over many years. Jackson Pollock was born in Cody, Wyoming in nineteen twelve. He grew up in the states of Arizona and California.

Pollock later said that the wide-open land of these western areas greatly influenced his expansive artwork. In nineteen thirty he moved east to New York City where he studied at the Art Students League.

There, Pollock spent a few years studying with the artist Thomas Hart Benton who painted images of every day American life. Pollock's early works are similar to his teacher's kind of painting. However, Pollock slowly left this traditional art education behind.

Pollock's work had many other influences. For example, he liked a group of Mexican painters who made murals. Murals are large images that the artists paint directly onto a wall.

Some of these painters were working in New York City in the nineteen thirties, so Pollock was able to see them work. Pollock borrowed several methods and ideas from these artists. They included the use of large canvases, the method of freely applying paint and honoring old and new traditions.