Jackson Pollock's major early work Mural (1943) was commissioned by
Peggy Guggenheim for the entrance hall of her East 61st Street New York
residence. Mural-sized, though not actually a mural--the work is painted
on a six-meter-long canvas, not directly onto the wall--this vast,
frieze-like panorama would be hugely influential in twentieth-century
American art.
In Jackson Pollock's Mural*:* Energy Made Visible, David Anfam
explores the painting and its impact by way of the different themes it
incorporates, including the imagery of action and process, the big
picture, the "gothic," the body, dance, and Romanticism, relating them
to art historical precedents, Abstract Expressionism, Pollock's
psychology, and the context of American art and culture in the pre- and
postwar years. This analysis is accompanied by reproductions of
Pollock's work as well as imagery from the period that sheds light on
the artist's development.
Gifted to the University of Iowa Museum of Art in 1948, Mural has
rarely traveled, and it is now the focus of a traveling exhibition
curated by Anfam. This accompanying volume offers crucial analysis and
historical background on one of Pollock's most significant works.