Tourist Guide

Poured, Dripped, Splattered

Autumn Rhythm by Jackson Pollock

Unlike the other paintings, Autumn Rhythm by Jackson Pollock has no significant meaning when painted. In fact, when Pollock first started painting this piece, he had no idea what he was doing. By laying the canvas on the floor, he introduced a new technique of art that would change the idea of abstract expressionism. He first dripped black paint everywhere on the canvas, then brown, then turquoise, and finally, white. By doing so, Pollock created a rhythm of different sensations and a contrasting depiction of the different lines. There were dark and light lines, straight and curved, horizontal and vertical, and lastly, thick and thin lines.

Autumn Rhythm is a perfect example that exemplifies the idea of accident and control. The dripping of the paint over the canvas was accidental. Pollock did not plan out the painting beforehand, yet the end-result of the painting turned out to be a masterpiece. When looking at the picture, the overlapping of the different lines make it hard to spot any mistakes.

What first attracted me to this painting was that it looked like a mess. Unlike the other paintings in that particular room, this painting did not have a central meaning. It was just black and white lines crossing one another everywhere on the canvas. The overlaps of the different lines, however, produced a melodic feeling. The name of the painting truly matches the essence of its beauty. At the beginning, I thought that Pollock planned the whole painting out, until I read the description. Although I was unable to capture a picture of it, there was a similar painting to this one, also by Jackson Pollock. That painting, unlike this one, displayed an array of different colors – green, blue, yellow, etc. This was the first time in which I have seen an art like Pollock’s.

The quality of the video is bad, but below is a footage of Jackson Pollock at work: