© The Pollock-Krasner Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Interpretation
Pollock struggled with extreme variations of mood and alcoholism most of his adult life. From 1939 to 1940, he underwent therapy sessions with the psychiatrist Dr. Joseph Henderson that tapped into the psychoanalyst Carl Jung’s idea of a collective unconscious. These two works belong to a large group of drawings that the artist submitted to his therapist in the course of treatment. Henderson subsequently sold the drawings in 1969 and they were dispersed to numerous collections. After the group was published in 1970, Pollock’s widow, the artist Lee Krasner, sued Henderson, claiming the drawings were private in nature. While the court settled in favor of Henderson, such works continue to raise challenging questions about privacy and ownership, as well as the public display of art created for therapeutic reasons.
Information
- Title
- Untitled
- Object Number
- x1986-107
- Maker
- Jackson Pollock
- Medium
- Dark brown crayon
- Dates
- ca. 1939 – 1940
- Dimensions
- 24.7 x 20.9 cm. (9 3/4 x 8 1/4 in.)
- Catalog Raisonné
- O'Connor/Thaw: 511 Wysoph: 20
- Credit Line
- Museum purchase, Caroline G. Mather Fund
- Culture
- American
- Marks/Labels/Seals
- Printed on verso: Crash 80 lb.
- Type
- Materials
Dr. Joseph L. Henderson, Class of 1927, San Francisco, California; Maxwell Galleries, San Francisco, California; Nielsen Gallery, Boston, Massachusetts
- Francis Valentine O’Connor and Eugene Victor Thaw, Jackson Pollock: a catalogue raisonné of paintings, drawings, and other works, (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1978). , p. 89, no. 511 (illus.)
- "Acquisitions of the Art Museum 1986," Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 46, no. 1 (1987): p. 18–52, p. 25, p. 27 (illus.)
- Claude Cernuschi and Michael P. Tezzatesta, Jackson Pollock, "psychoanalytic" drawings, (Durham, NC: Duke University Press in association with the Duke University Museum of Art, 1992)., pl. 20
- John Wilmerding et al., American Art in the Princeton University Art Museum: volume 1: drawings and watercolors, (Princeton: Princeton University Art Museum; New Haven, CT; London: Yale University Press, 2004), p. 264, cat. no. 68; p. 265 (illus.); p. 340, checklist no. 859
- Josef Helfenstein, Nina Zimmer, Michaela Leja and Stefan Neuner, The figurative Pollock, (London?: Prestel, 2016)., cat. no. 39, pp. 100-101
- States of Health: Visualizing Illness and Healing (November 2, 2019 –Sunday, February 2, 2020)
- West to Wesselmann: American Drawings and Watercolors from the Princeton University Art Museum (October 16, 2004–July 23, 2006)
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