Читать книгу Pollock - Donald Wigal - Страница 31

“I am doubtful of any talent, so what even I choose to be, will be accomplished only by long study and work.”[64]

Age 17

After much advice and encouragement, Guggenheim decided to see more of Pollock’s works. She went to his apartment/studio, where she was to meet him. It was an event which would be described in several biographies, plays and movies, and from different points of view in several memoirs. Most agree Guggenheim arrived at the Pollock apartment before Jackson himself arrived.

Testing the lady’s patience even more was her climb up four flights of steps. In some versions, including the Harris movie, Guggenheim climbed the flights only to find he wasn’t home. She returned to street level where she found the drunken Pollock. He and Krasner had returned home from Peter Busa’s wedding. Furious, Guggenheim then climbed up the stairs again, this time with the artist and Krasner[65].

Guggenheim then at first saw only Krasner’s works. She complained she did not come to see the works of ‘L.K.,’ the signature Lee used at the time. Years later, Robert Hughes of Time Magazine stated Guggenheim always seemed to be so jealous of Krasner’s place in Pollock’s life that “she refused to acknowledge her as an artist.” (53)

When Guggenheim finally saw Pollock’s works in the apartment she was impressed, but she was not yet enthusiastic. Before making a decision concerning a one-man show, she said she would have to call on the expert opinion of her advisor, Marcel Duchamp. In 1925, Duchamp had participated in the first exposition in Paris of Surrealists and related artists[66].

Once Duchamp saw the Pollock paintings en masse, he expressed approval as well, though in an inarticulate way and with his characteristic reserve. A conversation between him and Pollock surely would have been one of few words. However, the master’s authoritative nod was the final push Guggenheim needed to gamble on Pollock. His first one-man show was held later that year.

After her partner and art advisor, Max Ernst, left her in 1943, Guggenheim relied on the advice of three people in her entourage, especially Howard Putzel, a former Los Angeles art gallery owner, the Chilean artist Matta and, less officially, James Johnson Sweeney. Putzel became her confidant and secretary in Paris. Sweeney would become chairman of the divisions of painting and sculpture at MoMA. All three of Guggenheim’s inner-circle advisors directed her to young Americans.

Guggenheim’s initial association with Lee Krasner, then Jackson Pollock, was through others whom she already knew and trusted. She believed in Putzel and he believed in Pollock. Likewise, she respected Duchamp and he approved of Pollock. Herbert Matter, the photographer/designer, also saw Pollock’s works at the artist’s apartment. Matter told James John Sweeney, and he in turn told Peggy Guggenheim. (In 2003 Matter’s son, Alex, reported that he found a trove of 32 paintings alledged by Pollock and given by the artist to his father.)[67]

Matta joined those who recommended Pollock to Guggenheim after meeting the artist during discussions about automatism. The discussion group included artists Robert Motherwell, William Baziotes, Peter Busa, and Jerome Kamrowskia. Peggy Guggenheim assembled a jury to select works for a Spring Salon. The judges included Duchamp and Sweeney, and most important, Piet Mondrian. He was the highly respected master of the de Stijl movement, recently arrived in Manhattan.

It seems Guggenheim’s driving obsession was sex. Some say she allowed herself to be overly involved with the men she was attracted to. The record shows she neglected not only women artists, but also other men who were excellent modern American painters, including Motherwell, Guston, Tworkov, Kline, and even Rothko.

A similar infamous event, often dramatised but apparently based solely on fragmentary evidence, is when Pollock walked naked into a room filled with guests, then urinated into a fireplace during the party following the hanging of his Mural. Guggenheim’s memory of the evening was Pollock walking naked into the room, but she didn’t mention urination. However, she stressed the man was certainly difficult and sometimes he could upset people – and furniture. However, she added he could be quite the opposite when not drinking. She believed he felt trapped in the big city and his life would have been more fulfilling had he lived out West, far from the social life of a large city, which she thought may have frightened him[68].