Jackson Pollock / 1912-1956

A man stands darkly silhouetted in front of a gray, clouded, empty surface lean-ing against the wall of a room (p. 7). His arms hang loosely by his sides; although his eyes are invisible, he seems to be looking directly into the camera. For över six months now, this man has been struggling With the task of painting a mural, nearly two-and-a-half meters high and över six meters long (8 x 19 feet), for the entry hail of a wealthy collector's house. The enormous canvas stands in his New, York apartment, where a wall had to be torn out to accommodate it. Now, just after Christmas 1943, the time for procrastination has run out. The collector is planning a party, and she insists the canvas must be finished by that date. And so the artist plunges into his work and, in the course of a single night and morning, under incredible pressure, completes a painting that would mark a turning-point in twentieth-century art: Mural (pp. 8-9).