Pollock’s explosions stain Barcelona’s Joan Miró Foundation

Barcelona (ACN).- The legacy of Jackson Pollock is explained in the new temporary exhibition organised by Barcelona’s Joan Miró Foundation. The exhibition shows the influence Pollock’s works had on later artists. It is called “Explosion! The legacy of Jackson Pollock” and it is made up of 70 works from 35 different artists, such as Andy Warhol, Lynda Benglis, Shozo Simamoto, Yoko Ono and Jackson Pollock himself. The exhibition wants to reflect on the influence and connections the so-called ‘action painting’ – of which Pollock is the main representative – had on later artists. It is made up of paintings, photographs, videos, performances, dance and audio bites. “Jackson Pollock’s legacy is very powerful and we focus on the inflection point” that happened after the Second World War until the 1970s, explained the exhibition’s curator Magnus af Petersens on Monday. The show is co-produced by Barcelona’s Fundació Joan Miró and the Moderna Museet from Stockholm. It will run from Wednesday until 24^th February  2013.

The exhibition begins with the artists who emerged after WWII from the painting by Jackson Pollock and the Japanese artistic group Gutai, who was working in a radical way in the border between painting and performance. “We are showing this legacy, this heritage and the way of understanding art that arose in many parts of the world at the same time; and this is a new thing” offered by this exhibition, emphasised Magnus af Petersens.

The curator explained that they have focused on the years in which “the explosion happened” and the concept of art was enlarged. The selection of artists reflects this goal. “There are works from younger artists, but we focused on the change’s moment”, he underlined. “Jackson Pollock’s legacy is very powerful and we focus on the inflection point”, he said. According to Petersens, in many of the works that are shown in the exhibition or from contemporary art there are references to Pollock, and not only to him but also to the captions of Pollock working and dancing. “This change of the work of art’s importance as an object makes it turn into the celebration of an event”, he said.

A change that was pushed forward by artist who decided to start from scratch and express feelings using violent attacks against the traditional conventions on painting and the fabric of the canvas. This can be seen in Pollock’s works at the exhibition.

There are also works from Kazuo Shiraga, who painted with his feet being attached to a rope; from Shozo Shimamoto, who threw glass bottles filled with paint against his work; or from Niki de Saint Phalle, who shot a rifle against panels and soffit boards prepared by her with balloons filled with paint and surrounded by layers of plaster. The exhibition also shows works from Andy Warhol, Allan Kaprow and even from Yoko Ono.