Jackson Pollock

by Steven Naifeh

  34. A PERFECT MATCH

  SOURCES

  Books, articles, manuscripts, lecture, film, and transcripts

  Ashton, The New York School; Ashton, Yes, but …; Barrett, The Truants; Diamonstein, ed., Inside New York’s Art World; Fried, Three American Painters; Friedman, JP; CG, Art and Culture; Gruen, The Party’s Over Now; PG, Out of This Century; Kunitz, ed., Twentieth Century Authors; Lader, Arshile Gorky; Maurer and Bayles, Gerome Kamrowski; Nemser, Art Talk; OC&T, JP; O’Doherty, American Masters; Phillips, A Partisan View; Pointer and Goddard, Harry Jackson; Potter, To a Violent Grave; Rose, LK; Seldes, The Legacy of Mark Rothko; Tabak, But Not for Love; Weld, Peggy.

  R[enée] A[rb], “Spotlight on: De Kooning,” Art News, Apr. 1948; Robert Alan Aurthur, “Hitting and Boiling Point, Freakwise, at East Hampton,” Esquire, June 1972; M[argaret] B[reuning], “Fifty-Seventh Street in Review,” Art Digest, Jan. 15, 1948; “The Best,” Time, Dec. 1, 1947; Robert Coates, “The Art Galleries,” New Yorker, Jan. 17, 1948; Rosalind Constable, “The Betty Parsons Collection,” Art News, Mar. 1968; DP&G, “Who Was JP?” Art in America, May–June 1967; Grace Glueck, “Krasner and Pollock: Scenes from a Marriage,” Art News, Dec. 1981; CG, “Art,” Nation, Jan. 24, 1948; CG, “Jean Dubuffet, JP,” Nation, Feb. 1, 1947; CG, “The Present Prospects of American Painting and Sculpture,” Horizon, Oct. 1947; “JP: An Artists’ Symposium, Part I,” Art News, Apr. 1967; Ken Kelley, “Betty Parsons Taught America to Appreciate What It Once Called ‘Trash’: Abstract Art,” People, Feb. 29, 1978; Alonzo Lansford, “Fifty-Seventh Street in Review,” Art Digest, Jan. 15, 1948; Grace Lichtenstein, “The Remarkable Betty Parsons,” Art News, Mar. 1979; Aline B. Loucheim, “Betty Parsons: Her Gallery, Her Influence”; “The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle,” illustrated in Dyn, Nov. 1944; Cindy Nemser, “LK’s Paintings,” Artforum, Dec. 1973; JP, “My Painting,” Possibilities I, Winter 1947–1948; “Reviews and Previews,” Art News, Feb. 1947; “Reviews and Previews,” Art News, Feb. 1948; [Berton Roueché], “Unframed Space,” New Yorker, Aug. 5, 1950; William Rubin, “JP and the Modern Tradition, Part II,” Artforum, Feb. 1967; Calvin Tomkins, “A Keeper of the Treasure” (“Keeper”), New Yorker, June 9. 1975; Emily Wasserman, “LK in Mid-Career,” Artforum, Mar. 1968; B[en] W[olf], “NonObjectives by Pollock,” Art Digest, Jan. 15, 1947; Judith Wolfe, “Jungian Aspects of JP’s Imagery,” Artforum, Nov. 1972.

  J. Hoberman, “Harold Rosenberg’s Radical Cheek,” New York Voice Literary Supplement, May 1986; Michael Kernan, “LK, Out of Pollock’s Shadow,” Washington Post, Oct. 23, 1983; Amei Wallach, “LK: Out of JP’s Shadow,” Newsday, Sept. 23, 1981.

  Melvin Paul Lader, “PG’s Art of This Century: The Surrealist Milieu and the American Avant-Garde, 1942–1947” (Lader) (Ph.D. thesis), Newark: University of Delaware, 1981; Ellen Gross Landau, “LK: A Study of Her Early Career (1926–1949)” (Ph.D. thesis), Newark: University of Delaware, 1981; May Natalie Tabak, “A Collage” (unpub. ms.).

  LK (lecture), Columbia University, Oct. 5, 1983.

  Strokes of Genius: JP (film), Court Productions, 1984.

  CG, int. by Kathleen Shorthall for Life, Nov. 9. 1959, Time/Life Archives; CG, int. by James T. Vallière, Mar. 20. 1968, AAA: LK, int. by Barbara Rose, July 31, 1966, AAA; LK, int. by Dorothy Seckler, Dec. 14, 1967, AAA; Daniel T. Miller, int. by Kathleen Shorthall for Life, Nov. 9. 1959, Time/Life Archives; Barnett Newman, int. by Kathleen Shorthall for Life, Nov. 9, 1959, Time/Life Archives; Alfonso Ossorio, int. by Forrest Selvig, Nov. 19, 1968, AAA; Betty Parsons, int. by Kathleen Shorthall for Life, Nov. 9, 1959, Time/Life Archives; JP, int. by Dorothy Seiberling for Life, July 18, 1949, Time/Life Archives.

  Interviews

  Ruth Ann Applehof; Ethel Baziotes; Ward Bennett; Norman Bluhm; Paul Brach; Charlotte Park Brooks; James Brooks; Fritz Bultman; Peter Busa; Herman Cherry; Dane Dixon; Ted Dragon; Herbert Ferber; Phyllis Fleiss; Lisa Fonssagrives; B. H. Friedman; Joe Glasco; CG; Grace Hartigan; Janet Hauck; Ben Heller; Elizabeth Wright Hubbard II; Merle Hubbard; Edward Hults; Ted Hults; Edys Hunter; Sam Hunter; Harry Jackson; Buffie Johnson; Reuben Kadish; Gerome Kamrowski; LK; Ernestine Lassaw; Millie Liss; John Little; Cile Downs Lord; Maria-Gaetana Matisse; Herbert Matter; Mercedes Matter; ACM; George Mercer; George Sid Miller; Annalee Newman (int. by David Peretz); Alfonso Ossorio; Gustaf Peterson; Vita Peterson; Becky Reis; Milton Resnick; May Tabak Rosenberg; Miriam Schapiro; Ronald Stein; Ruth Stein; Hedda Sterne; Michael Stolbach; Esteban Vicente; Marta Vivas; Steve Wheeler; Roger Wilcox; Eileen Wilhelm; Betsy Zogbaum.

  NOTES

  Lee’s response to new work: Glueck, “Krasner and Pollock,” p. 61: “Krasner doesn’t remember her specific response when Pollock began to make his breakthrough ‘drip’ paintings in 1946.” “Everything I saw”: Q. in Glueck, “Krasner and Pollock,” p. 61. Sleeping twelve hours; Lee tiptoeing: Tabak, p. 40. “Major step”: CG, “Jean Dubuffet, JP,” p. 139. “Controlled yellows”: W[olf], “NonObjectives by Pollock,” p. 21. “Latest pictures”: “Reviews and Previews,” Feb. 1947, p. 45. Mural: OC&T 102, I, p. 95. Show selling well: At least six of the sixteen paintings exhibited were sold by the following September, OC&T IV, p. 240. JP’s résumé listed only “important purchases,” so the number of sales may well have been higher. Davis’s purchases: Friedman, p. 95. “Unreasonable dread”: Adapted from Tabak, p. 48.

  “Wouldn’t touch Americans”: Ossorio, int. by Selvig, Nov. 19. 1968. “Going blind”: Q. by Parsons, in Tomkins, “A Keeper of the Treasure,” pp. 51–52. “It isn’t my fish”: Q. by Maria-Gaetana Matisse. Levy: Weld, p. 356. Kootz: Friedman, p. 115; Weld, p. 356. Former socialite: Seldes, p. 23, Parsons’s new gallery: Lader, p. 327. Gallery at 15 East Fifty-seventh Street; Sam Kootz had the other half, which Sidney Janis later took over; Gruen, pp. 236–37. She began the gallery with $1,000 of her own savings and $4,000 borrowed from friends. “I’m crazy”: Q. in Weld, p. 356. Passing on Jackson: For story about Rothko, Pollock, Newman, and Still coming to Parsons and wanting to stay together as a group, see Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 51. Apparently, when Parsons took only three of them, their feelings of solidarity succumbed to commercial and career concerns. Willard: Lader, p. 327. Realist galleries: Friedman, p. 116.

  Compromise: Friedman, p. 116. Continued allowance: Weld, p. 356. Details of deal: Friedman, pp. 115–16; Lader, p. 327; Weld, p. 356; Reis. The precise financial arrangement between Parsons and Guggenheim is not clear. Some sources say that Betty was to get any commissions over and above $300 per month; see Friedman, p. 116. The question seems to be about the method of accounting and what commission, if any, Parsons earned on the earlier paintings, for which Guggenheim set the price.

  Early Parsons history: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 47. “Such heavy drinking”: Parsons, q. in Tomkins, p. 49. Visit to Springs: Parsons. q. in DP&G, “Who Was JP?” p. 55; Constable, ‘The Betty Parsons Collection,” p. 58. “Settled down”: LK. Student and debutante: Lichtenstein, “The Remarkable Betty Parsons,” p. 55. Family house: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 46. Father: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 48. Yale’s first rector: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 46. Mother; “thank God”: Q. by Parsons in Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 46. Class with Borglum: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 47. Marriage: Spring 1919; Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 47. Divorce: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 46. Schuyler alcoholic: Tomkins, “Keeper, p. 47. Homosexual: Connors.

  Armory Show: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 47. Paris: Tomkins, “Keeper,” pp. 47–48. Description of Parsons: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 48. “Da Vinci forehead”: Saul Steinberg, q. in Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 46. Mistaken for Garbo: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 48. “You see the Sphinx”: Q. in Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 46. Dietrich and Graham: Tomkins, “Keeper,” pp. 47–48. Roosevelt: Kelly, “Betty Parsons,” p. 78. Ferber: “Betty was as uninterested in men as she was in making money.” “His whole rhythm”: Q. in DP&G, “Who Was JP?” p. 55. “Loved his looks”: Parsons, q. in DP&G, “Who Was JP?” p. 55. Introduction by Newman: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 52. “Rapid-fire”: Lichtenstein, “The Remarkable
Betty Parsons,” p. 55. “Small truthful”: Friedman, p. 116. Social Register background grating: Potter, p. 109. Lesbianism threatening: Jackson. Art reflecting the West: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 51. Showing appreciation: LK. Barnett Newman took Parsons to Springs for the weekend. At first things didn’t go well: “After dinner we all sat on the floor, drawing with Japanese pens. [Jackson] broke three pens in a row. His first drawings were sensitive, then he went wild. He became hostile, you know. Next morning, he was absolutely fine”; Parsons. q. in DP&G, “Who Was JP?” p. 55.

  Parsons and verbal contracts: Seldes, p. 23. “Not as tolerant”: JP, q. by Wilcox. “Dumped”: Parsons, q. in Kelley, “Betty Parsons,” p. 78. Sweeney asked to supervise: Weld, p. 356. Gallery dismantled: Lader, p. 326. Collection in storage: PG, p. 268. Phone off hook: Tabak, p. 40. “That’s probably why”: Q. by Edys Hunter. “Jackson was afraid”: Southgate. “Trade was in her blood”: Tabak, p. 47: “Perhaps, to some extent, it was in the blood of most of the artists’ wives.” Preserving foods: Ruth Stein. Stella visiting; “swell”: SMP to CCP, EFP, and Jeremy, late Summer-Fall of 1947. “Heavy hocks”: Ronald Stein. Jackson with children: Elizabeth Wright Hubbard II; Merle Hubbard. Jewish food: Ruth Stein—pahrkas (cabbage rolls), knedler (dumplings), tsimis (carrots and sweet potatoes).

  Lee nurturing Jackson: Ruth Stein: “She used to say, ‘Let him be, let him be.’ But she meant, ‘Let him be great. Let him be a great artist.’” Greenberg as houseguest: In fact, Lee was shaping Greenberg into the most important arrow in her quiver. Not that she admired his criticism (she didn’t), but as she herself said (int. by Rose, July 31, 1966), he was an art critic, and there were few critics at the time from which to choose. Wheeler: “Naturally, being very aggressive and very career-minded, Lee latched on to anyone who had some entrée that could be of value to her.” Beach and bike-riding: CG. Collection of Mirós: Rose, p. 65. “City development”: Ted Hults. “The direction”: Wilcox, although he insists that JP “wasn’t about to go kissing Greenberg’s ass.” “Clem likes this”: Q. by Sam Hunter. It was the simple but effective technique by which Greenberg had already rid JP’s work of subject matter; O’Doherty, p. 110: “It must have been a happy surprise to Greenberg when Pollock, in 1947, began to paint pictures which absolved that quintessential formalist critic of the embarrassment of ‘content.’”

  Greenberg’s speech pattern: Barrett, p. 138. “Who in his right mind”; Virginia upbringing: CG. “Looked like idleness”: Q. in Kunitz, p. 386. Austere father: Fleiss. “Appetite for business”: Q. in Kunitz, p. 386. “Sounding off”: Tabak, “Surrealists,” in “Collage,” p. 443. “Clem leaped”: Tabak, “Surrealists,” in “Collage,” pp. 443–44. “I was awed”: Fleiss: “I remember I was writing then, and I would give him something to read. He’d say, ‘It looks like it was written by my fifteen-year-old sister.’ And I’ll tell you, after that, I didn’t write for many, many years.” “To be attacked”: CG. Contentiousness: Ashton, p. 160: “[CG’s] role as agent provocateur in relation to the general public was indispensable. When Greenberg said ‘great,’ the press replied ‘heaven forbid’; but Greenberg’s consistency and his confidence could not be ignored.” Jackson’s respect for book learning: CG, q. in Potter, p. 182. “Don’t tell Clem”: Q. by Bultman. “Listened intently”: Lord. “Jackson was never a bore”: CG.

  Guston’s fellowship: Ashton, p. 76. Jackson inquiring about application: Myers to JP, Sept. 15, 1947. “Historical death”: Barrett, p. 147. “Pollock points a way”: CG, “Jean Dubuffet, JP,” p. 139. “Large movable pictures”: JP, q. in OC&T IV, p. 238. “My painting does not come”: Pollock, “My Painting,” p. 78. “Hard-headed”: CG, “The Present Prospects,” pp. 24–27. “The Best?”: p. 55. Reproduction upside down: For the story that the reproduction was printed upside down, see Friedman, p. 104; Potter, p. 92. We suspect that the source of this bit of apocrypha was Lee Krasner, who, in her inventive way of speaking, may have used such a phrase to refer to the article’s total failure to understand JP’s art.

  Thanksgiving visit: SMP to FLP, MLP, and Jonathan, Dec. 11, 1947: “Sande & Jay both had to work.” “Jack was busy”: SMP to FLP, MLP, and Jonathan, Dec. 11. 1947; Reflection of the Big Dipper: OC&T 175, I, pp. 172–73. Sea Change: OC&T 177, I, pp. 174–75. Vortex: OC&T 178, I, p. 176. Phosphorescence: OC&T 183, I, pp. 182–83. Shooting Star: OC&T 182, I, p. 181. Cathedral: OC&T 184, I, pp. 184–85. Gravel: As in Galaxy, OC&T 169, I, pp. 166–67. Other objects: As in Full Fathom Five, OC&T 180, I, pp. 178–79. Greenbergians on reflective paint: CG, int. by Shorthall, Nov. 9. 1959. See also Fried (pp. 44–46) for the Greenbergian view of the use of reflective paint in Frank Stella’s work.

  Titles: Friedman, p. 94: JP’s typical approach was to have close friends “free-associate verbally around the completed work. From their responses, from key words and phrases, he often, though not always chose his titles—typically, vague, metaphorical, or ‘poetic.’” Manheims helping with titles: LK, q. in Wolfe, “Jungian Aspects of JP’s Imagery,” p. 72. Pollock’s paintings compared to Gothic cathedrals: CG, “The Present Prospects,” p. 25. Manheim’s titles: See Friedman, pp. 119–20. “Vetoing”: LK, q. in Wolfe, “Jungian Aspects of JP’s Imagery,” p. 72. Staying with Ruth: Stein.

  Parsons’s gallery: Loucheim, “Betty Parsons,” p. 141. “Communications break down”: Coates, “The Art Galleries,” p. 57. Handful of guests: Friedman, p. 116. Floors: Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 52. Hostility: Parsons. q. in Potter. p. 92. “All too Dionysiac”: Sterne. “Radical”: Glasco. “Protecting priestess”: Loucheim, “Betty Parsons,” p. 141. “I give them walls”: Q. in Tomkins, “Keeper,” p. 52. Jackson sober: Parsons, q. in Potter, p. 92. Tearing up hat: Friedman, p. 116.

  “Lightweight”: “Reviews and Previews,” Feb. 1948. pp. 58–59. “Tremendous energy”: Coates, “The Art Galleries,” p. 57. “Pollock’s current method”: Lansford, “Fifty-Seventh Street in Review,” p. 19. “[This show] signals”: CG, “Art,” Jan. 24. 1948, p. 108. The seeds of Greenberg’s modernist argument were planted in this article; the argument was later taken up and elaborated by William Rubin, in particular. “Where the Pollocks differ” from the 1913 Mondrians, Rubin wrote in 1967 (“JP and the Modern Tradition, Part II,” p. 25), “is that they contain no vestige at all of modeling. … The very shallow optical space of his pictures is not a matter of illusion but of the actual overlapping of different color skeins and the tendency of certain colors to ‘recede’ or ‘advance.’ … Jackson worked to minimize any sense of spatial illusion by locking the warm colors literally inside the skeins of the non-hues, of which the aluminum in particular was used to dissolve any sense of discreteness the space of the web might have—in effect to ‘confuse’ it into a unified mass of light sensations.” Rubin’s error is not in describing what happens visually in one of JP’s drip paintings, but in attributing to JP consciousness and purposefulness where clearly none existed.

  Jackson and Analytical Cubism: Kadish. Different source: Barrett, pp. 148–49. “Pollock was not a painter in pursuit of strict form. … The impulse in Pollock’s painting came from elsewhere; it did not operate within the convention of strict and controlled form; if anything, it was disruptive of form. Pollock is very much in the American grain, like the writers Walt Whitman or William Faulkner, who throw themselves on the vitality of their inspiration, trusting that its sheer vital flow will be sufficient to generate enough form to sustain the work.” Jackson’s source: Barrett, p. 149: “In Pollock this inspiration is not always sufficient to generate enough form, and the painting sags; when the vitality of his primary impulse carries him along, the effect is stunning.” “Didn’t agree”: CG, int. by Shorthall, Nov. 9. 1959. Greenberg said this after his “‘American-Type’ Painting” article had appeared, long after he had abandoned JP and Lee Krasner, and long after they had more or less written him off as a sponsor.

  “Feeling that their dog”: Weld, p. 358. Walter Phillips: M. B., “Fifty-Seventh Street in Review,” Art Digest, Jan. 15, 1948,
p. 19. Two paintings sold: Weld, p. 358. Prearranged sale: This accounts for the note in the Time-Life Archives saying that three paintings were sold. Heating one floor: Landau, “LK,” p. 240. At $21 a cord: JP to Ed and Wally Strautin, Nov. 29. 1945. Wood for stove: Parsons, q. in Potter, p. 93. Bounced check: Int. by David Peretz. A $56 grocery bill: George Sid Miller has given several versions, including “close to forty dollars” (q. in Potter, p. 103); the figure used here is the one he gave us. Credit: George Sid Miller, q. in Potter. p. 102. Three more to choose from: JP, int. by Seiberling, July 18, 1949. Sold painting for $7,500: George Sid Miller, q. in Potter, p. 103. Miller (int. by Shorthall, Nov. 9. 1959) said he got seven times what he paid for it which would be only $392; but he also admitted that he didn’t like to talk about the amount for fear that people would start asking for loans, and he said that the amount offered was “such a high price [he] couldn’t resist.” The figure of $7,300 is more credible. “Wouldn’t take his paintings”: Bluhm: “The guy who runs Home Sweet Home [transportation service] was here recently and was telling me about Jackson wanting to give him a painting when Jackson owed him something, and the guy said he wouldn’t take that. Dumb asshole.”

  “Made a real issue”: Q. in Solomon, p. 183. “Because of his behavior”: Levy, q. in Potter, p. 92. Little keeping money secret: Little. Trip with Wilcox: Wilcox. Aurthur, “Hitting the Boiling Point,” p. 200: Aurthur reports that both JP and Wilcox had old Fords when, in fact, JP didn’t get his until later in 1948. “Offering a discount”: Q. in Potter, p. 93. Lee’s campaign: Porter. Francis visiting Parsons: Francis. “Terrible financial condition”: Parsons to PG, Apr. 5, 1948 q. in OC&T II, p. 66. “[Peggy] just disappeared”: Parsons. q. in Weld, p. 359. “[Peggy’s] dedication”: Q. in Weld, p. 359. Francis purchase: Francis. “We lived a year”: Q. in [Roueché], “Unframed Space,” p. 16.