Primary Sources: Art & Artists: Pollock, Jackson

Jackson Pollock collection at the Museum of Modern Art.

"The ten-minute film, simply called Jackson Pollock 51 (the 51 being short for 1951), lets you see Pollock painting from a unique angle -- through glass. The film achieved Namuth's aesthetic goals, but it came at a price. Apparently the filming taxed Pollock emotionally, and by the evening, the painter decided to pour himself some bourbon, his first drink in two years. A blowout argument followed; Pollock never stopped drinking again; and it was downhill from there..."

"Here, LIFE presents outtakes from photographer Martha Holmes' 1949 shoot with Pollock — images that offer a unique portrait of the artist's home life with wife and fellow painter Lee Krasner on eastern Long Island, and the singular working method that made him an art-world icon."

"The papers of Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner in the Archives of American Art were digitized in 2006 and 2008. The bulk of the Jackson Pollock papers and photographs from the Lee Krasner papers were scanned from originals and total 15,096 images. The bulk of the Lee Krasner papers were digitized from 7 reels of microfilm."

"Lee Krasner (1908-1984) was a painter in Easthampton, N.Y. and married to Jackson Pollock.

These interviews are part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and others."

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