Artists

The Museum of Modern Art recently finished conservation work on three paintings by Jackson Pollock, and in the process discovered new details in each that show that “The life of the pictures is in the details.” That’s the kicker quote from Jim Coddington, the museum’s chief conservator, taken from an online article in ARTnews.

The story, Fresh Prints: MoMA Washes Pollock’s Hands, discusses work on Number 1A, 1948,  One: Number 31, 1950, and Echo: Number 25, 1951– and, as it turned out, a different discovery was made in each.

In Number 1A,

…he applied paint to his palms and pressed them on the surface. Pollock also used his hands to lightly smear color across the painting. He worked some sections with a brush. He dragged pigment directly from a tube to create ribbons of impasto. In between, he dripped and poured paint on the canvas….They were always visible in the top right portion of the canvas [at right] and various other points throughout. With the soot and grime gone, they take a more dominant role, showing how the artist used his own body as a tool to mark his newly horizontal canvases. Now more than ever, the work evokes the walls of a prehistoric cave…

In One: Number 31, 

…they saw how Pollock paid careful attention to small sections of the canvas, with deliberate application of paint, resin, and turpentine. The small marks were clearly calculated—subtle movements at odds with the typical image of the action painter engaged in a rhythmic ritual dance…

And in Echo: Number 25, 

…They knew from recollections of Lee Krasner, Pollock’s widow, that he had squeezed the bulb of a turkey baster to spread enamel paint on the picture. But now they understood better how he used this kitchen tool. The lines represent the points where the baster touched the surface of the picture—suggesting a process more akin to drawing, and even less like a ritual dance.

ARTnews refers readers to posts about the project on MoMA’s blog, calling them “riveting.” I’ve read a few — they are indeed fascinating.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of MoMA

 

This weekend, ArtPrize in Grand Rapids, Mich., awarded $560,000 in cash to the artists of 16 installations — the end of a 19-day competitive event in which the public visited artworks spread around the city, and voted on those they liked best. 49,078 people voted, casting  446,850 votes — they chose the 10 public awards, 10 artists who together won $360,000. An eight-person panel of art professionals decided six juried award winners totaling $200,000.

Here are the two winners, tops in each contest:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s pretty easy to tell which won the public award and which the professionals’ award, isn’t it? The top, a landscape art quilt called Sleeping Bear Dune Lakeshore by Ann Loveless won the first, and the bottom — one scene from Ecosystem, a site-specific, architectural intervention by Carlos Bunga, pleased the pros.

It happens every year, and ArtPrize has been going since 2009. It’s great, in a way, but it also throws the chasm between the public and the pros into high relief. I wasn’t there, so I can’t comment on these pieces in particular, but it seems to me that there’s work to do on visual literacy — or else the professionals are going to be proven wrong by history.

The public awarded nine other awards — Anni Crouter of Flint, Mich. for Polar Expressed, three separate 48” by 72” polar bear paintings, got $75,000 and Andy Sacksteder, who made  UPLifitng, a bronze sculpture depicting two dancers, will receive $50,000,

And $10,000 each, to:

• Paul Baliker, Palm Coast, Fl., Dancing with Mother Nature
• Jason Gamrath, Seattle, Wa., Botanica Exotica a Monumental Collection of the Rare beautiful
• Benjamin Gazsi, Morgantown, West Va., Earth Giant
• Robin Protz, New Hartford, Conn., Myth-or-Logic
• Fraser Smith, St. Pete Beach, Fl., Finding Beauty in Bad Things: Porcelain Vine
• Michael Gard, SanFrancisco, Ca.,Taking Flight
• Nick Jakubiak, Battle Creek, Mich., Tired Pandas

Pictures of those entries are here.

The other juried award winners, who each received $20,000, are

• Kyle Staver, New York, N.Y., Europa and the Flying Fish
• Cooley / Lewis, Chattanooga, Tenn., Through the Skies for You
• Shahzia Sikander, New York, N.Y. The Last Post
• Urban Space J.D. Urban, Brooklyn, N.Y., united.states : an everydaypeople project
• Greg Bokor, Beverly, Mass., Erase 

Congrats to all.

Photo Credits: Courtesty of ArtPrize