June 7, 2024 • 28 mins
1945. East Hampton. Lee Krasner and Jackson Pollock start a new life in a farmhouse 100 miles east of New York City.
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin. In the winter of nineteen forty five, Lee and
Jackson found themselves about one hundred miles east of New
York City.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
It was freezing cold. It came in a rainstorm. They
had a borrowed delivery wagon with all their stuff in it.
What were they thinking.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Standing outside an old, dilapidated farmhouse. They pulled on the door,
it didn't budge. This was meant to be their new home.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
They had forgotten to pick up the key from the realtor,
so they had to break in.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
This is art historian Helen Harrison I sat down with
her at this very farmhouse Lee and Jackson moved into
almost eighty years ago. Helen looked after it for over
three decades. The house is in the hamlet of Springs
in the Hampton's. Yeah, that Hampton's, the one that today
(01:21):
is dotted with millionaire mansions. Madonna has one, so did
Jay Z and Beyonce. But when Lee and Jackson arrived
in nineteen forty five, it looked very.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
Different, definitely not the quote unquote Hampton's. It was a
very quiet backwater, very rural community. Farmers and fisherfolk, mainly
dairy farms, corn fields and fishing shacks.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
When Lee and Jackson first broke down the door, they
were in for a shock.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
The house was a bit of a fixer upper.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Lee looked at the mess around her, wallpaper peeling off,
junk everywhere.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Was built for a fisherman's family, and even the fisherman's
mackin ore was hanging on a hook and the back
of the door. And they also had no plumbing or
central heating.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
So why on earth were Lee and Jackson moving here
from the bohemian Greenwich village.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
To get Jackson on track to give him the kind
of space that he needed to really function properly. They
didn't know anybody in the neighborhood. They had no other distractions.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Two years earlier, Peggy Guggenheim, the biggest dealer in New York,
had agreed to represent Jackson. Lead managed to convince her,
and what it meant in practice was that Jackson and
Lee now had a for them generous stipend of one
hundred and fifty dollars a month in return for Jackson's paintings.
(03:09):
He came up with an idea to get out of
New York City to this farmhouse in Springs to give
Jackson mental and physical space to create, and it's here
that he would end up making some of the most
famous American artworks of all time. I'm Katie Hessel and
(03:31):
this is Death of an Artist Krasner and Pollock, Episode four,
Jackson Pollock, Inc. It's nineteen forty five and Lee was
in a ramshackle farmhouse, surrounded by junk, clambering over fishing equipment, rain,
(03:55):
slashing the window panes. Thinking about where to even begin, We.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
Did nothing but peer war paper. Every single room in
the house tavered with war paper.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Lee and Jackson spent those first few weeks and springs
clearing the place out. They learned how to use a
manual pump to get the water going unclogged the chimney,
worked out how to heat a house with coal, and
crucially where to hang all their paintings.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Jackson closed off windows, broke down walls to create space
to hang paintings.
Speaker 4 (04:31):
When Lee and Jackson arrived, they were perceived as being,
you know, some of those not us, and a little
bit strange.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
This is Pruden's Carabine, with family roots here going back
as far as sixteen forty eight.
Speaker 4 (04:48):
My name is Prudence Talmadge Hamilton Carabine. All of those
names make me a long term eastchamp to Night.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
An old school hamp Tonight with a big extended family.
Speaker 4 (05:05):
I had probably three hundred cousins living in Springs. You know.
One was a plumber, one was a carpenter, One did
landscaping and mowing and that kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Prudence was born a couple of years after Lee and
Jackson turned up, but her family got to know them
pretty quickly.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
Well. Jackson's toilet would need work or the plumbing would
back up. Jackson and Lee moved into a house of
some age which constantly needed fixing of some way or another.
They needed plumbing, and they needed electrical, and they needed
a carpentry, and they needed help in the house. And
(05:42):
their form of payment from the early days until maybe
fifty two was a painting, which was a joke.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
Yeah, Jackson and Lee gave out paintings in return for
plumbing gigs. Their stipend was good, but it wasn't enough
to cover a house refurbishment.
Speaker 4 (06:01):
And what was he painting? Well, nothing that we would
understand for those of us who lived here was you know,
you're getting all these Jackson parlor paintings. What are you
going to do with them paper your living room. There
simply was no understanding of what he was trying to
say with paint.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Once Lee and Jackson got the basic house functions in order,
running water heating, they started to think about the most
important question, where to paint. There was one building on
the property that they hadn't really tackled yet, a rickety
storage space used for fishing equipment. It was the biggest
(06:44):
space they had, twenty one feet by twenty one feet.
Walking in, Lee could immediately see its potential. It would
make an incredible painting studio. Together, Lee and Jackson cleared
it out, gave it a new wooden floor, and cut
a big window high up in the north wall for
(07:06):
maximum natural light. As they stood marveling at its transformation,
Lee made a crucial decision. This barn it should be Jackson's,
not hers. She would take the small upstairs spare bedroom
as her studio, a cramped room with thin windows on
(07:28):
two sides. Lee felt that Jackson needed the big space more.
After all, that's why they were here in the country
to get Jackson painting again. Over the past couple of years,
Jackson's drinking had got even worse, so bad. He wasn't
even painting much anymore. But soon Lee and Jackson settled
(07:55):
into their new countryside routine. Here's Helen Harrison, the art
historian and keeper of the house.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Jackson was not a morning person.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
I think I could have guessed that, but the mornings
were Lee's time.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
She had to do some of her own work before
she had distractions from him.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
In the tiny bedroom, Lee was making kaleidoscopic paintings at
her tabletop using shods of luminous color. They'd become known
as her little Images.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
And then she would make breakfast for him around what
we would think of as lunchtime. He would nurse a
cup of coffee and smoke a cigarette. Then he would
go out to the barn and do his work as
long as the daylight held.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
At the end of the day, Lee would get dinner ready,
will Jackson might wander down the road to decompress.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
He would go over to what was then called Jungle Pete,
a local watering hole.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Jackson was still drinking, but a lot less more to socialize.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
He would hang out with the local guys, you know,
the plumber and the roofer.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
He also made other kinds of friends.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
When Jackson was first here. He somehow tamed a crow
that came to the house and he called it corcor
And we have the bird house that he actually built
for Corcaw and missus Corkaw, and I guess all the
little cor.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
Cocks painting all day talking to birds. For the first
time in years, it felt like Lee and Jackson were
at peace. They could breathe a little, just have space
and time to create. One day in late summer nineteen
(09:53):
forty seven, Lee was painting in her upstairs room when
Jackson called up to her from the backyard. Mary Gabriel,
our guide in this series, told me what happened.
Speaker 5 (10:04):
Next.
Speaker 6 (10:05):
He came out to say, you know, come on out,
I want to show you something.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Lee dropped her Russia's and went downstairs.
Speaker 6 (10:12):
What he wanted to know from her was just simply,
does it work? Does this painting that he's just created
that he doesn't even understand resonate with her.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
She hadn't seen any of his new work for a
while now.
Speaker 6 (10:25):
He'd been locked away in the barn working all summer,
and finally decided to invite her in.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Walking across towards the barn, Lee felt a tingle of excitement.
Speaker 6 (10:37):
Anticipating what she's going to see, knowing that whatever it
is is something that's never existed before. There's no way
to prepare yourself for that. It's like meeting a new person.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Lee opened the door. Jackson stood there, surrounded by half
filled paint cans and canvasses taped to the floor.
Speaker 6 (11:05):
She walked into a room filled basically with constellations of paint,
fields of moving color, massive works that Jackson had danced around,
dripped around, poured paint an What.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Lee had just walked in on were the earliest versions
of Jackson's drip paintings. These are what you probably envisage
when you think of Jackson Pollock, all consuming universes of
drip paint that dance from edge to edge. These are
(11:41):
the works that will become some of the most famous
and valuable paintings in the history of the twentieth century.
(12:07):
Lee's eyes darted between explode visions of color, fluid black
swells overlaid with shiny silver paint, thin red lines breaking
through thick yellow strokes. It looked like Jackson had poured
paint directly from cans onto the canvases, or dripped it
(12:27):
from sticks. The only time he'd used a brush was
to flick little droplets. Lee even spotted cigarette butts and
coins they'd fallen onto the canvases as Jackson walked all
over them.
Speaker 6 (12:43):
Lee looked at all of that, surrounded by this cacophony,
works that were so chaotic and yet controlled in a
really magnificent way, Works that told the story of the
chaos that was his mind, but also the universe.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
At this moment in time in nineteen forty sive, no
one outside a small group was paying much attention to
Jackson's work, or to modern art at all. Most people
in America dismissed it as a fad, strange stuff. They
didn't see the point or beauty in. Lee knew that
these latest works by Jackson, these drip paintings, deserved widespread attention.
(13:32):
But how was she going to get that attention? How
could she change public opinion in America. Lee realized she
needed help. She needed somebody who could explain to America
why these paintings were important, someone to help her promote
Jackson's art, and soon she knew just who to ask.
(13:59):
One day, a while later, Lee and Jackson were sitting
around their table in Springs deep in conversation with Lee's
old friend Clement Greenberg late thirties. He was bulled, a chainsmoker,
and a heavy drinker, and he would come to play
a huge role in the rise and fall of Jackson Pollock.
Speaker 6 (14:26):
Clement Greenberg had become one of the most powerful critics
in the United States. His voice was respected.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
Lee had first met Clem almost a decade before at
a party in nineteen thirty seven. Back then, he was
a customs officer for the Port of New York trying
to learn how to write about art, and Lee introduced
him to everyone she knew. Clem wanted to be an
art critic, but back then that wasn't really a job
(14:55):
that existed in America.
Speaker 6 (14:57):
Newspapers really didn't even employ art critics. They had theater
critics or literary critics, music critics. Art was so little
part of the American way of life that it just
simply wasn't necessary.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Most people didn't look at contemporary art in the thirties,
but by the fifties there were more exhibitions of this
new art and people needed someone to explain it.
Speaker 6 (15:24):
Newspapers and magazines started scrambling to find people to write
about them. Art critics suddenly became necessary.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
When Jackson had his first solo show in nineteen forty three,
Lee had invited Clem along.
Speaker 6 (15:37):
Clem was one of the very few who wrote about
it in a way that showed a real sense of
understanding and also intrigue that this person was on a
path and maybe this is the most interesting new American
artist he had seen. So there's no way Lee wouldn't
have appreciated that comment and recognized Clem as someone she
(16:01):
should cultivate.
Speaker 1 (16:02):
When Clem first started out, he wrote for niche publications
read mainly by other artists, but now he was art
critic for The Nation, a popular monthly magazine read all
over America. Lee figured if there was someone who could
influence wider public opinion, it'd probably be him.
Speaker 6 (16:24):
His voice was aired's most powerful in Jackson's work, was
at the point where it was going to become the
most original that he had done.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Lee realized that timing was just right. They finished their coffee,
and I like to imagine that's when Lee led Clem
out to the barn to show him Jackson's latest work,
what would come to be known as the Drip Paintings.
He saw in them what Lee had seen, something that
(16:55):
could change the whole story of art. And so Lee
made Clem a proposition, a kind of business arrangement. What
if he would promote Jackson's work to the wider public.
Speaker 6 (17:10):
Making sure that the world knew about this man, Jackson.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Pollack, and she would be Jackson's agent.
Speaker 6 (17:18):
Lee and Clam were the models of what today we
take for granted, which is an artist's agent, which is
a Lee, and an artist's promoter, which was Clem.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Clem immediately understood what Lee was suggesting that together they
could make Jackson Pollock the most famous American painter of
all time.
Speaker 6 (17:41):
Clem and Lee naturally fell into this kind of role
that today it would almost be known as Jackson Pollock Inc.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Today, it takes a number of different people to put
an artist's work out into the world. You need the gallery, writers, curators, critics, advisors,
a whole team, and Lee, she was way ahead of
the curve on this. Over the next few months, Lee
(18:15):
and Clem worked full steam ahead. Lee tried to keep
Jackson off the booze while fielding calls from collectors and
dealers and Jackson's new galerist Betty Parsons. Peggy had since
closed shop in New York and returned to Europe. As
for Clem, he was constantly thinking about opportunities to write
about Jackson. In January nineteen forty eight, Jackson had his
(18:39):
first ever exhibition of the now famous strip paintings. In
the reaction, it was not good. One member of the
public called the work quote wallpaper. Another scrawled shit next
to one painting. But Clem still went out to bat
for Jackson.
Speaker 6 (19:00):
He had been so bold as to call Jackson the
greatest in print.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
In his article for the Nation, he wrote, quote, it
is indeed a mark of Pollock's powerful originality that he
should present problems in judgment that must await the digestion
of each new phase of his development before they can
be solved. Lee also knew nobody was ever going to
(19:27):
get it straight away, but she trusted the power of
the Jackson Pollock Inc. Machine, trusted Clem's words to trickle down.
Speaker 6 (19:35):
He his work as a propagandist was significant, and his
voice was important enough that even mainstream news publications started
picking up on this.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
A year and a half later, one summer's day, Lee
got a call. It was Life Magazine. They wanted to
do an article on Jackson.
Speaker 6 (20:06):
Life magazine was the most widely read magazine in the
United States at the time. It had a circulation of
five million. Everybody got this magazine in the most rural
corners of the country. This was the American publication. To
have an article on Jackson Pollock in that would be revolutionary.
(20:27):
It would be introducing this artist who people barely knew of,
to the entire country.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
On the day of the shoot, Lee was marching around
the barn trying to get Jackson to pose for the photos,
brushing the cigarette ash off his denim jacket. He looked tired, nervous,
and disheveled.
Speaker 6 (20:52):
Lee's role in the Life photo session and later in
the interview was very much that of Jackson Pollock's manager agent.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
Lee persuaded Jackson to shuffle himself in front of the
latest painting he'd been working on.
Speaker 6 (21:09):
A painting called Summertime, which was a very long, narrow
painting that almost looked like a musical score. Jackson leaned
against the painting in his denim jacket, paint splattered clothes,
with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, the ultimate
macho American.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
The photo shoot was awkward, but the interview was even worse.
Speaker 6 (21:40):
It was actually Lee doing much of the talking, because
Jackson was so tongue tied, he was so terrified that
he wasn't actually able to speak. And so Lee did
the role that she had whenever gallery owners would come,
whenever collectors would come to look at his work, She
could do it in her sleep.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
A few weeks later, a bundle of magazines arrived at
the h Lee tore it open, took out Life magazine,
and nervously flicked to the centerfold. Lee read the headline,
is he the greatest living painter in the United States?
(22:27):
Above it was a photo of Jackson.
Speaker 6 (22:33):
He was Marilyn Brando. He was a working guy. He
had calloused hands, and no regard whatsoever for the elitism
usually associated with artists. You know, in American minds, an
artist was somebody who wore berets and spoke French. Jackson
Pollock showed that an American artist could be a man
(22:55):
who looked like he worked at a gas station.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
This was it exactly what Lee had been working towards.
It was why she'd wanted to move out here, why
she'd fought so hard to keep him sober, why she'd
sacrificed her own work. Jackson was no longer a nobody
connected with a niche art movement.
Speaker 6 (23:22):
The country was talking about Jackson. He had actually become
the most talked about artist in America. He was American.
Speaker 1 (23:31):
Eric Lee's project Jackson Pollock, Inc. Was a triumph for
now Ever since Jackson had become the Life magazine painter,
there had been an explosion of press interest, interviews, articles, photos.
(23:54):
It had all done wonders for Lee and Jackson's bottom line.
They'd sold around two thirds of the paintings from their
last show, with buyers including everyone from Wall Street sliquors
to Hollywood actors. Jackson's star had risen, and now he
was set to appear in his very own film, a
film showing him making his trip paintings in action. In
(24:18):
the fall of nineteen fifty, Lee watched Jackson in the yard,
posing in front of yet another camera as a director
called cut. Hardly any other artist had been filmed like this,
and Lee felt a film was the perfect vehicle to
maximize Jackson's visibility to a broader public.
Speaker 5 (24:38):
Jackson was supposed to pay on cue, but Jackson wasn't
a performance artist.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
This is art historian Professor Gail Levin, Lee's biographer.
Speaker 5 (24:49):
He wasn't used to performing in front of an audience,
much less a camera. Is painting usually solitary in his studio.
Maybe he posed for a still, but to be filmed
this is really invasive.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
They'd been filming for a number of days, and Lee
could see Jackson become increasingly moody and withdrawn, like he
wanted to get away from it all, away from all
this press. Lee left the chute and headed back into
the warmth of the house. She needed to cook for
a party they were hosting that night, a party to
(25:27):
celebrate Jackson's upcoming show.
Speaker 5 (25:30):
They were having a big dinner party with good friends
of his.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
At some point Jackson arrived. Lee felt the room go
quiet as he pushed everyone aside and headed straight for
the drink's cabinet.
Speaker 5 (25:47):
He pulls a bottle of liquor out. Lord knows why
it was in the house, but I guess they offered
it to others.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Lee knew Jackson had been strained lately, but she hadn't
predicted this.
Speaker 5 (25:59):
He hasn't been drinking for two years, and he starts
bolting it down for Jackson to really decide he's going
to drink. This is big trouble.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
Lee ushered everyone through to the dinner table. Maybe food
would help.
Speaker 5 (26:15):
And he's drinking and drinking and they're all around the table.
Pollock just upsets everything by turning the table onto the floor.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Nobody said a word. Jackson laughed and he.
Speaker 5 (26:37):
Quips, shit, I wasn't upset. The table was as the
remains of the specially prepared dinner were left on the floor.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
After that night, things would never be the same for
Lee and Jackson.
Speaker 5 (27:00):
Pollock was dragging her down a very black, deep hole
where he would have these sessions where he would drink
himself into oblivion. There was no support system. It was
all on.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
Lee coming up. In a desperate attempt to bring Jackson
back from the brink, Lee turns to Clement Greenberg for help,
and he recommends his own therapist from a mysterious group
(27:32):
of psychotherapists who lived together in New York's Upper West Side.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
They literally had people living in communes. They were controlling
who they could sleep with, all kinds of things. It
became known as the Selavanian cult.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Pollen was told don't worry about your drinking, having affairs,
and finding a new sex partner was a good idea.
Speaker 5 (27:56):
Sending Jackson to a Salavanian therapist was the kiss of death.
As far as I'm concerned.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
That's next time on Death of an Artist. Death of
an Artist Krasner and Pollock is produced by Pushkin Industries
and samasdat Audio. Clem Hitchcock is our producer. Story editing
by Dasherlitz at Sina, Sophie Crane and Karen Schakerji from Pushkin.
(28:29):
The executive producer is Jacob Smith from samasdaut Audio. The
executive producers are Dasherlitz at Sena and Joe Sykes. Sound
design by Peregrin Andrews. Original scoring and our theme were
composed by Martin Orstwick. Fact checking by Arthur Gompertz. Special
(28:49):
thanks to Jacob Weissberg. I'm Katie Hessel.
Pushkin. In the winter of nineteen forty five, Lee and
Jackson found themselves about one hundred miles east of New
York City.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
It was freezing cold. It came in a rainstorm. They
had a borrowed delivery wagon with all their stuff in it.
What were they thinking.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Standing outside an old, dilapidated farmhouse. They pulled on the door,
it didn't budge. This was meant to be their new home.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
They had forgotten to pick up the key from the realtor,
so they had to break in.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
This is art historian Helen Harrison I sat down with
her at this very farmhouse Lee and Jackson moved into
almost eighty years ago. Helen looked after it for over
three decades. The house is in the hamlet of Springs
in the Hampton's. Yeah, that Hampton's, the one that today
(01:21):
is dotted with millionaire mansions. Madonna has one, so did
Jay Z and Beyonce. But when Lee and Jackson arrived
in nineteen forty five, it looked very.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
Different, definitely not the quote unquote Hampton's. It was a
very quiet backwater, very rural community. Farmers and fisherfolk, mainly
dairy farms, corn fields and fishing shacks.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
When Lee and Jackson first broke down the door, they
were in for a shock.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
The house was a bit of a fixer upper.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Lee looked at the mess around her, wallpaper peeling off,
junk everywhere.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Was built for a fisherman's family, and even the fisherman's
mackin ore was hanging on a hook and the back
of the door. And they also had no plumbing or
central heating.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
So why on earth were Lee and Jackson moving here
from the bohemian Greenwich village.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
To get Jackson on track to give him the kind
of space that he needed to really function properly. They
didn't know anybody in the neighborhood. They had no other distractions.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Two years earlier, Peggy Guggenheim, the biggest dealer in New York,
had agreed to represent Jackson. Lead managed to convince her,
and what it meant in practice was that Jackson and
Lee now had a for them generous stipend of one
hundred and fifty dollars a month in return for Jackson's paintings.
(03:09):
He came up with an idea to get out of
New York City to this farmhouse in Springs to give
Jackson mental and physical space to create, and it's here
that he would end up making some of the most
famous American artworks of all time. I'm Katie Hessel and
(03:31):
this is Death of an Artist Krasner and Pollock, Episode four,
Jackson Pollock, Inc. It's nineteen forty five and Lee was
in a ramshackle farmhouse, surrounded by junk, clambering over fishing equipment, rain,
(03:55):
slashing the window panes. Thinking about where to even begin, We.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
Did nothing but peer war paper. Every single room in
the house tavered with war paper.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Lee and Jackson spent those first few weeks and springs
clearing the place out. They learned how to use a
manual pump to get the water going unclogged the chimney,
worked out how to heat a house with coal, and
crucially where to hang all their paintings.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Jackson closed off windows, broke down walls to create space
to hang paintings.
Speaker 4 (04:31):
When Lee and Jackson arrived, they were perceived as being,
you know, some of those not us, and a little
bit strange.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
This is Pruden's Carabine, with family roots here going back
as far as sixteen forty eight.
Speaker 4 (04:48):
My name is Prudence Talmadge Hamilton Carabine. All of those
names make me a long term eastchamp to Night.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
An old school hamp Tonight with a big extended family.
Speaker 4 (05:05):
I had probably three hundred cousins living in Springs. You know.
One was a plumber, one was a carpenter, One did
landscaping and mowing and that kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Prudence was born a couple of years after Lee and
Jackson turned up, but her family got to know them
pretty quickly.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
Well. Jackson's toilet would need work or the plumbing would
back up. Jackson and Lee moved into a house of
some age which constantly needed fixing of some way or another.
They needed plumbing, and they needed electrical, and they needed
a carpentry, and they needed help in the house. And
(05:42):
their form of payment from the early days until maybe
fifty two was a painting, which was a joke.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
Yeah, Jackson and Lee gave out paintings in return for
plumbing gigs. Their stipend was good, but it wasn't enough
to cover a house refurbishment.
Speaker 4 (06:01):
And what was he painting? Well, nothing that we would
understand for those of us who lived here was you know,
you're getting all these Jackson parlor paintings. What are you
going to do with them paper your living room. There
simply was no understanding of what he was trying to
say with paint.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Once Lee and Jackson got the basic house functions in order,
running water heating, they started to think about the most
important question, where to paint. There was one building on
the property that they hadn't really tackled yet, a rickety
storage space used for fishing equipment. It was the biggest
(06:44):
space they had, twenty one feet by twenty one feet.
Walking in, Lee could immediately see its potential. It would
make an incredible painting studio. Together, Lee and Jackson cleared
it out, gave it a new wooden floor, and cut
a big window high up in the north wall for
(07:06):
maximum natural light. As they stood marveling at its transformation,
Lee made a crucial decision. This barn it should be Jackson's,
not hers. She would take the small upstairs spare bedroom
as her studio, a cramped room with thin windows on
(07:28):
two sides. Lee felt that Jackson needed the big space more.
After all, that's why they were here in the country
to get Jackson painting again. Over the past couple of years,
Jackson's drinking had got even worse, so bad. He wasn't
even painting much anymore. But soon Lee and Jackson settled
(07:55):
into their new countryside routine. Here's Helen Harrison, the art
historian and keeper of the house.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Jackson was not a morning person.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
I think I could have guessed that, but the mornings
were Lee's time.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
She had to do some of her own work before
she had distractions from him.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
In the tiny bedroom, Lee was making kaleidoscopic paintings at
her tabletop using shods of luminous color. They'd become known
as her little Images.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
And then she would make breakfast for him around what
we would think of as lunchtime. He would nurse a
cup of coffee and smoke a cigarette. Then he would
go out to the barn and do his work as
long as the daylight held.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
At the end of the day, Lee would get dinner ready,
will Jackson might wander down the road to decompress.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
He would go over to what was then called Jungle Pete,
a local watering hole.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Jackson was still drinking, but a lot less more to socialize.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
He would hang out with the local guys, you know,
the plumber and the roofer.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
He also made other kinds of friends.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
When Jackson was first here. He somehow tamed a crow
that came to the house and he called it corcor
And we have the bird house that he actually built
for Corcaw and missus Corkaw, and I guess all the
little cor.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
Cocks painting all day talking to birds. For the first
time in years, it felt like Lee and Jackson were
at peace. They could breathe a little, just have space
and time to create. One day in late summer nineteen
(09:53):
forty seven, Lee was painting in her upstairs room when
Jackson called up to her from the backyard. Mary Gabriel,
our guide in this series, told me what happened.
Speaker 5 (10:04):
Next.
Speaker 6 (10:05):
He came out to say, you know, come on out,
I want to show you something.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Lee dropped her Russia's and went downstairs.
Speaker 6 (10:12):
What he wanted to know from her was just simply,
does it work? Does this painting that he's just created
that he doesn't even understand resonate with her.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
She hadn't seen any of his new work for a
while now.
Speaker 6 (10:25):
He'd been locked away in the barn working all summer,
and finally decided to invite her in.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Walking across towards the barn, Lee felt a tingle of excitement.
Speaker 6 (10:37):
Anticipating what she's going to see, knowing that whatever it
is is something that's never existed before. There's no way
to prepare yourself for that. It's like meeting a new person.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Lee opened the door. Jackson stood there, surrounded by half
filled paint cans and canvasses taped to the floor.
Speaker 6 (11:05):
She walked into a room filled basically with constellations of paint,
fields of moving color, massive works that Jackson had danced around,
dripped around, poured paint an What.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Lee had just walked in on were the earliest versions
of Jackson's drip paintings. These are what you probably envisage
when you think of Jackson Pollock, all consuming universes of
drip paint that dance from edge to edge. These are
(11:41):
the works that will become some of the most famous
and valuable paintings in the history of the twentieth century.
(12:07):
Lee's eyes darted between explode visions of color, fluid black
swells overlaid with shiny silver paint, thin red lines breaking
through thick yellow strokes. It looked like Jackson had poured
paint directly from cans onto the canvases, or dripped it
(12:27):
from sticks. The only time he'd used a brush was
to flick little droplets. Lee even spotted cigarette butts and
coins they'd fallen onto the canvases as Jackson walked all
over them.
Speaker 6 (12:43):
Lee looked at all of that, surrounded by this cacophony,
works that were so chaotic and yet controlled in a
really magnificent way, Works that told the story of the
chaos that was his mind, but also the universe.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
At this moment in time in nineteen forty sive, no
one outside a small group was paying much attention to
Jackson's work, or to modern art at all. Most people
in America dismissed it as a fad, strange stuff. They
didn't see the point or beauty in. Lee knew that
these latest works by Jackson, these drip paintings, deserved widespread attention.
(13:32):
But how was she going to get that attention? How
could she change public opinion in America. Lee realized she
needed help. She needed somebody who could explain to America
why these paintings were important, someone to help her promote
Jackson's art, and soon she knew just who to ask.
(13:59):
One day, a while later, Lee and Jackson were sitting
around their table in Springs deep in conversation with Lee's
old friend Clement Greenberg late thirties. He was bulled, a chainsmoker,
and a heavy drinker, and he would come to play
a huge role in the rise and fall of Jackson Pollock.
Speaker 6 (14:26):
Clement Greenberg had become one of the most powerful critics
in the United States. His voice was respected.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
Lee had first met Clem almost a decade before at
a party in nineteen thirty seven. Back then, he was
a customs officer for the Port of New York trying
to learn how to write about art, and Lee introduced
him to everyone she knew. Clem wanted to be an
art critic, but back then that wasn't really a job
(14:55):
that existed in America.
Speaker 6 (14:57):
Newspapers really didn't even employ art critics. They had theater
critics or literary critics, music critics. Art was so little
part of the American way of life that it just
simply wasn't necessary.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Most people didn't look at contemporary art in the thirties,
but by the fifties there were more exhibitions of this
new art and people needed someone to explain it.
Speaker 6 (15:24):
Newspapers and magazines started scrambling to find people to write
about them. Art critics suddenly became necessary.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
When Jackson had his first solo show in nineteen forty three,
Lee had invited Clem along.
Speaker 6 (15:37):
Clem was one of the very few who wrote about
it in a way that showed a real sense of
understanding and also intrigue that this person was on a
path and maybe this is the most interesting new American
artist he had seen. So there's no way Lee wouldn't
have appreciated that comment and recognized Clem as someone she
(16:01):
should cultivate.
Speaker 1 (16:02):
When Clem first started out, he wrote for niche publications
read mainly by other artists, but now he was art
critic for The Nation, a popular monthly magazine read all
over America. Lee figured if there was someone who could
influence wider public opinion, it'd probably be him.
Speaker 6 (16:24):
His voice was aired's most powerful in Jackson's work, was
at the point where it was going to become the
most original that he had done.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Lee realized that timing was just right. They finished their coffee,
and I like to imagine that's when Lee led Clem
out to the barn to show him Jackson's latest work,
what would come to be known as the Drip Paintings.
He saw in them what Lee had seen, something that
(16:55):
could change the whole story of art. And so Lee
made Clem a proposition, a kind of business arrangement. What
if he would promote Jackson's work to the wider public.
Speaker 6 (17:10):
Making sure that the world knew about this man, Jackson.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Pollack, and she would be Jackson's agent.
Speaker 6 (17:18):
Lee and Clam were the models of what today we
take for granted, which is an artist's agent, which is
a Lee, and an artist's promoter, which was Clem.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Clem immediately understood what Lee was suggesting that together they
could make Jackson Pollock the most famous American painter of
all time.
Speaker 6 (17:41):
Clem and Lee naturally fell into this kind of role
that today it would almost be known as Jackson Pollock Inc.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Today, it takes a number of different people to put
an artist's work out into the world. You need the gallery, writers, curators, critics, advisors,
a whole team, and Lee, she was way ahead of
the curve on this. Over the next few months, Lee
(18:15):
and Clem worked full steam ahead. Lee tried to keep
Jackson off the booze while fielding calls from collectors and
dealers and Jackson's new galerist Betty Parsons. Peggy had since
closed shop in New York and returned to Europe. As
for Clem, he was constantly thinking about opportunities to write
about Jackson. In January nineteen forty eight, Jackson had his
(18:39):
first ever exhibition of the now famous strip paintings. In
the reaction, it was not good. One member of the
public called the work quote wallpaper. Another scrawled shit next
to one painting. But Clem still went out to bat
for Jackson.
Speaker 6 (19:00):
He had been so bold as to call Jackson the
greatest in print.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
In his article for the Nation, he wrote, quote, it
is indeed a mark of Pollock's powerful originality that he
should present problems in judgment that must await the digestion
of each new phase of his development before they can
be solved. Lee also knew nobody was ever going to
(19:27):
get it straight away, but she trusted the power of
the Jackson Pollock Inc. Machine, trusted Clem's words to trickle down.
Speaker 6 (19:35):
He his work as a propagandist was significant, and his
voice was important enough that even mainstream news publications started
picking up on this.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
A year and a half later, one summer's day, Lee
got a call. It was Life Magazine. They wanted to
do an article on Jackson.
Speaker 6 (20:06):
Life magazine was the most widely read magazine in the
United States at the time. It had a circulation of
five million. Everybody got this magazine in the most rural
corners of the country. This was the American publication. To
have an article on Jackson Pollock in that would be revolutionary.
(20:27):
It would be introducing this artist who people barely knew of,
to the entire country.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
On the day of the shoot, Lee was marching around
the barn trying to get Jackson to pose for the photos,
brushing the cigarette ash off his denim jacket. He looked tired, nervous,
and disheveled.
Speaker 6 (20:52):
Lee's role in the Life photo session and later in
the interview was very much that of Jackson Pollock's manager agent.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
Lee persuaded Jackson to shuffle himself in front of the
latest painting he'd been working on.
Speaker 6 (21:09):
A painting called Summertime, which was a very long, narrow
painting that almost looked like a musical score. Jackson leaned
against the painting in his denim jacket, paint splattered clothes,
with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, the ultimate
macho American.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
The photo shoot was awkward, but the interview was even worse.
Speaker 6 (21:40):
It was actually Lee doing much of the talking, because
Jackson was so tongue tied, he was so terrified that
he wasn't actually able to speak. And so Lee did
the role that she had whenever gallery owners would come,
whenever collectors would come to look at his work, She
could do it in her sleep.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
A few weeks later, a bundle of magazines arrived at
the h Lee tore it open, took out Life magazine,
and nervously flicked to the centerfold. Lee read the headline,
is he the greatest living painter in the United States?
(22:27):
Above it was a photo of Jackson.
Speaker 6 (22:33):
He was Marilyn Brando. He was a working guy. He
had calloused hands, and no regard whatsoever for the elitism
usually associated with artists. You know, in American minds, an
artist was somebody who wore berets and spoke French. Jackson
Pollock showed that an American artist could be a man
(22:55):
who looked like he worked at a gas station.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
This was it exactly what Lee had been working towards.
It was why she'd wanted to move out here, why
she'd fought so hard to keep him sober, why she'd
sacrificed her own work. Jackson was no longer a nobody
connected with a niche art movement.
Speaker 6 (23:22):
The country was talking about Jackson. He had actually become
the most talked about artist in America. He was American.
Speaker 1 (23:31):
Eric Lee's project Jackson Pollock, Inc. Was a triumph for
now Ever since Jackson had become the Life magazine painter,
there had been an explosion of press interest, interviews, articles, photos.
(23:54):
It had all done wonders for Lee and Jackson's bottom line.
They'd sold around two thirds of the paintings from their
last show, with buyers including everyone from Wall Street sliquors
to Hollywood actors. Jackson's star had risen, and now he
was set to appear in his very own film, a
film showing him making his trip paintings in action. In
(24:18):
the fall of nineteen fifty, Lee watched Jackson in the yard,
posing in front of yet another camera as a director
called cut. Hardly any other artist had been filmed like this,
and Lee felt a film was the perfect vehicle to
maximize Jackson's visibility to a broader public.
Speaker 5 (24:38):
Jackson was supposed to pay on cue, but Jackson wasn't
a performance artist.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
This is art historian Professor Gail Levin, Lee's biographer.
Speaker 5 (24:49):
He wasn't used to performing in front of an audience,
much less a camera. Is painting usually solitary in his studio.
Maybe he posed for a still, but to be filmed
this is really invasive.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
They'd been filming for a number of days, and Lee
could see Jackson become increasingly moody and withdrawn, like he
wanted to get away from it all, away from all
this press. Lee left the chute and headed back into
the warmth of the house. She needed to cook for
a party they were hosting that night, a party to
(25:27):
celebrate Jackson's upcoming show.
Speaker 5 (25:30):
They were having a big dinner party with good friends
of his.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
At some point Jackson arrived. Lee felt the room go
quiet as he pushed everyone aside and headed straight for
the drink's cabinet.
Speaker 5 (25:47):
He pulls a bottle of liquor out. Lord knows why
it was in the house, but I guess they offered
it to others.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Lee knew Jackson had been strained lately, but she hadn't
predicted this.
Speaker 5 (25:59):
He hasn't been drinking for two years, and he starts
bolting it down for Jackson to really decide he's going
to drink. This is big trouble.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
Lee ushered everyone through to the dinner table. Maybe food
would help.
Speaker 5 (26:15):
And he's drinking and drinking and they're all around the table.
Pollock just upsets everything by turning the table onto the floor.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Nobody said a word. Jackson laughed and he.
Speaker 5 (26:37):
Quips, shit, I wasn't upset. The table was as the
remains of the specially prepared dinner were left on the floor.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
After that night, things would never be the same for
Lee and Jackson.
Speaker 5 (27:00):
Pollock was dragging her down a very black, deep hole
where he would have these sessions where he would drink
himself into oblivion. There was no support system. It was
all on.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
Lee coming up. In a desperate attempt to bring Jackson
back from the brink, Lee turns to Clement Greenberg for help,
and he recommends his own therapist from a mysterious group
(27:32):
of psychotherapists who lived together in New York's Upper West Side.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
They literally had people living in communes. They were controlling
who they could sleep with, all kinds of things. It
became known as the Selavanian cult.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Pollen was told don't worry about your drinking, having affairs,
and finding a new sex partner was a good idea.
Speaker 5 (27:56):
Sending Jackson to a Salavanian therapist was the kiss of death.
As far as I'm concerned.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
That's next time on Death of an Artist. Death of
an Artist Krasner and Pollock is produced by Pushkin Industries
and samasdat Audio. Clem Hitchcock is our producer. Story editing
by Dasherlitz at Sina, Sophie Crane and Karen Schakerji from Pushkin.
(28:29):
The executive producer is Jacob Smith from samasdaut Audio. The
executive producers are Dasherlitz at Sena and Joe Sykes. Sound
design by Peregrin Andrews. Original scoring and our theme were
composed by Martin Orstwick. Fact checking by Arthur Gompertz. Special
(28:49):
thanks to Jacob Weissberg. I'm Katie Hessel.
Host
Helen Molesworth
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