Jackson Pollock

by Steven Naifeh

  “Our plans”: SLM to CCP, Feb. Six-week trip: OC&T IV, p. 223. May 28: SMP to CCP, May 19, 1938. Running through streets: Solomon, p. 80, citing 1984 interview with Jacob Kainen. “Horrendously sick”: Kadish. Diller “covering” for JP: Friedman, p. 35. Ashton, p. 48: “Burgoyne Diller, one of the most diplomatic and sympathetic supervisors, personally visited artists who had not checked in to cajole and persuade them to meet their minimum obligation.” Dorothy Miller, int. by FVOC, Jan. 16, 1964, q. in FVOC, “The Genesis of JP,” p. 94: When “Pollock tried to leave the Easel Division because his work was not acceptable … Diller went after him and made him come back and accept his check.”

  Jackson applying for leave: SMP to CCP and EFP, May 19, 1938. Request denied: FVOC, “The Genesis of JP,” p. 70: JP was told that there could be no assurance that the job would be there when he got back. Four-day binge; “sherry wine and rotgut”; urine; Bellevue: Kadish. Jackson’s objections: Wilcox. Sande arranging commitment: SLM to Clarence O. Chaney, June 1, 1938. “Continued absence”: OC&T IV, p. 223. June 12: SLM to Clarence O. Chaney, June 1, 1938; OC&T IV, p. 223, note that it was June 11.

  21. RETREAT

  SOURCES

  Books, articles, manuscripts, and transcripts

  Carruth, The Bloomingdale Papers; Cohen, Notable American Women; Conn, ed., Current Therapy; Dreier, Margaret Dreier Robins; Goldmark, Impatient Crusader; C. G. Jung Institute of San Francisco, The Shaman from Elko; McKinzie, The New Deal for Artists; Mumford, Sketches from Life; OC&T, JP; Potter, To a Violent Grave; Pratt, I Learn from Children; Russell, The New York Hospital; Schueiderman, All for One.

  “The Bloomingdale Asylum: 1821–1894,” New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center Newsletter, Summer 1976; “Bloomingdale Hospital,” New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center Newsletter, Fall 1976; Donald M. Hamilton, Hewitt I. Varney, and James H. Wall, “Hospital Treatment of Patients with Psychoneurotic Disorders,” American Journal of Psychiatry, Sept. 1942; Donald M. Hamilton and James H. Wall, “Hospital Treatment of Patients with Psychoneurotic Disorders,” American Journal of Psychiatry, Jan. 1942; “How a Disturbed Genius Talked to His Analyst with Art,” Medical World News, Feb. 5, 1971; “More History … Construction 1922–Now,” New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center Newsletter, Winter 1977; Lewis Mumford, “Life on the Dial,” New York Review of Books, Feb. 20, 1964; “The New York Hospital: 1771–1976,” New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center Newsletter, Spring 1976; James H. Wall, “The Evaluation of Treatment,” Psychiatric Quarterly, no. 1, 1953; James H. Wall, “The Psychoses: Schizophrenia,” in Conn, ed., Current Therapy; James H. Wall, “Psychotherapy of Alcohol Addiction in a Private Mental Hospital,” Quarterly Journal of Studies on Alcohol, Mar. 1945; James Hardin Wall, “A Study of Alcoholism in Men,” American Journal of Psychiatry, July 1935; James H. Wall and Edward B. Allen, “Results of Hospital Treatment of Alcoholism,” American Journal of Psychiatry, Jan. 1944; Judith Wolfe, “Jungian Aspects of JP’s Imagery,” Artforum, Nov. 1972; C. L. Wysuph, “Behind the Veil,” Art News, Oct. 1970.

  “Labor Unions: A Friendly Explanation of Their Point of View,” NYT, Oct. 4, 1914; Helen Marot, “Conquering Time” (letter to the editor), NYT, Mar. 7, 1916; “Helen Marot,” NYT, June 4, 1940; “Organized 150,000 Women: Trade Union Leaguer’s Ten Years of Work Reviewed by Secretary,” NYT, May 10, 1914; “A Woman’s View of Labor: Helen Marot Discusses in Manly Fashion Pending Questions Between Wage Earners and Wage Players,” NYT, Oct. 1, 1916.

  Joseph L. Henderson, “JP: A Psychological Commentary” (lecture); Helen Marot, “Oneself: A Story of Arrested Growth and Development” (unpub. ms.); FVOC, “The Genesis of JP: 1912 to 1943” (Ph.D. thesis), Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 1965.

  SLM, int. by CG, c. 1956; SLM, int. by James T. Vallière, Aug. 1963, AAA.

  Interviews

  Peter Busa; Pat Carlton; Tamaria Eichelberg; Janet Hauck; Joseph Henderson; Axel Horn; Mervin Jules; Reuben Kadish; LK; Harold Lehman; Adele Lerner; ACM; Lewis Mumford; Sophia Mumford; Lucia Salemme; Rachel Scott; Patsy Southgate; Wally Strautin; James Wall; Steve Wheeler; Roger Wilcox.

  NOTES

  “Huge old asylum”: Carruth, p. vii. Details of admission; physical examination, neurological exam, X rays; specialists: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 550. Nurses: Carruth, p. vii. “Tenseness, depression”; “outstanding mental symptoms”; “suicidal preoccupation”: Hamilton, Varney, Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 244.

  “Voluntary patient”: See Wysuph, “Behind the Veil”, p. 52; Potter, p. 57. “Inebriate certification”; “an inebriate”; “for a period”: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 549. The state law was intended to short-circuit the grueling involuntary commitment process while ensuring that voluntary patients, like JP, remained at the hospital long enough for treatment to be effective. “Centered around”; alcohol banned, put to bed: Wall, “A Study,” p. 1399. Prolonged baths: Carruth, p. vii. Steam cabinet; wet packs: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 550. Ultraviolet light; massage: Wall and Allen, “Results,” p. 478. Preferable to drugs; “rich in calories”; “abundant fluid”; proper elimination; “colonic irrigations”: Wall, “A Study,” p. 1399. Free to roam: Wall. Mail checked: JP to SLM, June 21, 1938. Forced and tube feeding: Wall, “The Psychoses,” p. 717. “Impulsive, stuporous”; shock treatment: Wall, “The Evaluation,” p. 240; Carruth, p. vii; Wall, “The Psychoses,” pp. 717–18: “Shuffleboard, handicrafts, and tepid baths … together with occasional consultations with a doctor, were still regarded as good enough treatment even for deep psychosis, and when these failed the usual recourse was to shock and sometimes to isolation.” The typical treatment was “a series of from 8 to 12 electric shock treatments, one being administered every other day.” After five years of unsuccessful treatment, “prefrontal lobotomy must be considered.”

  Founding of hospital: See “The Bloomingdale Asylum;” “Bloomingdale Hospital;” “More History;” “The New York Hospital.” It was actually founded in 1771, making it the second oldest in the country, but the separate mental hospital didn’t come into being until 1821, when the first building was built on the present site of Columbia University; “The New York Hospital,” p. 1; “The Bloomingdale Asylum,” p. 2. Shackles and bars: Lerner. Bloodletting: “The New York Hospital,” p. 2. “Moral management”; humanitarian treatment; “as rational beings”: “The Bloomingdale Asylum,” pp. 1–2. New York’s richest families: Newsletter, “Bloomingdale Hospital,” pp. 5–6; “More History,” p. 4. Luxurious facilities: Russell, p. 428. Exercise and dance classes; age of men: Russell, p. 405: In some years, a third of those admitted were under thirty. “Competitive games”; “sweating out”: Wall, “A Study,” p. 1399. Clothing: Carruth, p. vii. Entertainments: Russell, p. 425. Plays and operettas: Wall and Allen, “Results,” p. 478. Olmsted: Eichelberg: There is some dispute now whether Olmsted himself or members of his staff designed the grounds. “Guest villas”; “for the insane”: Russell, p. 351. Evening events: Wall, “A Study,” p. 1400. “A substitute”: Wall and Allen, “Results,” p. 478. Charity case: ACM. “Breezy, affable”: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 551. McCoys in Bucks County: ACM. “Imagine you are getting”: JP to SLM, June 21, 1938. “[He] was rather”: Wall, q. in Potter, p. 57.

  Dr. Allen; working with Wall; Wall’s residency: Wall. Interest in “alcoholic psychosis”: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 550–51. Long-term study: Wall, “A Study.” Wall and Allen (“Results,” p. 474) describe a study of 100 alcoholic patients in which there was “1 sculptor.” Since Wall would have seen JP at the time not as a painter but as a sculptor, he could easily have been referring to JP. The 100 patients were studied from 1934 to 1940; follow-up studies conducted three to eight years after discharge “revealed that 23 were recovered and 19 were managing better”; Wall, “The Evaluation,” p. 243. Wall a Freudian: Wall: He was analyzed by Dr. Bertram Lewin. “Unburden himself”: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 550. “The patient must be convinced”: Wall, “The Psychoses,” p. 716. Jackson’s silence: Wall, “Psycho
therapy,” p. 553: “The shy, sensitive or schizoid person is usually passive in his adjustment to hospital treatment. He has used alcohol to overcome his shyness and often, in his social and professional adjustments, he has been able to give the impression of being a jovial extrovert. Beneath the submissive and passive exterior the patient is frequently seething with resentment. … Patients of this type are frequently those who have accomplished much in the fields of art, literature, music and science.” Turning to Sande: Wall, “The Psychoses,” p. 716: “Families … can help much in creating special environments for the unusually sensitive person.” SLM to CCP, July 1941, makes it clear that Wall briefed him on JP’s problems. Wall breaking down defenses: We can assume this on the basis of Sande’s letter, which demonstrates how clearly Wall identified JP’s problems, and of the therapy that Wall recommended, discussed later in the chapter, which was carefully adapted to JP’s problems.

  Wall’s sessions confidential: Wall. Although Wall has occasionally divulged small details of his interaction with JP to various people (cf, letter to LK, Sept. 12, 1963), he has refused to discuss the main points of their therapeutic sessions. Family drinking problem: It seems unlikely that either JP or Sande talked about their father’s alcoholism; Charles, Frank, and Jay still deny that he was an alcoholic, even while providing evidence of it. No hereditary factor: The genetic component of alcoholism had not yet been established at the time; see Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 551. “The example”: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 551. “Aggressive [women]”: Hamilton and Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 551. “In the case”: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 551. “Took no part”: Hamilton and Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 551. “The security of the family was disturbed in 29 [of 68] patients, who before the age of six lost one of their parents by death, desertion, or divorce”; Hamilton, Varney, and Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 243. “A weak individual”: Hamilton and Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 551.

  “Pathological but ambivalent”: Wall and Allen, “Results,” p. 474. “Close to their mothers”: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 552. “A source of growing”: Hamilton and Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 551. Adolescent drinking; “when drinking begins”; “fundamentally afraid”: Wall and Allen, “Results,” pp. 474–75. “Overt homosexuality”: Hamilton, Varney, and Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 243. “Effeminate approach”: Wall and Allen, “Results,” p. 474. Reasons for therapy: In a sample group of one hundred patients, precipitating factors were: childbirth, six; marriage of a near relative, six; serious illness of a relative, thirty-five; death of a member of the family, six; trouble with in-laws, six; change in work or economic circumstances, six; concern over some physical defect, five; disappointment in love, twelve; conflict over homosexuality, fourteen; other, sixteen; Hamilton, Varney, and Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 243.

  Gardening detail: Hauck; see also Russell, p. 422. Occupational diversions: Russell, pp. 422–23. “Metal work”: Wall, “A Study,” p. 1400. Copper bowl: OC&T 1045, IV. p. 123. Plaque: OC&T 1047, IV. p. 123. Working from drawings: Wall to LK, Sept. 12, 1963. “Attached great importance”: SLM, int. by James T. Vallière, second weekend in Aug. 1963, AAA. “He spoke”: Wall to FVOC, Mar. 28, 1974, q. in OC&T IV, p. 125.

  Jackson restless: JP to SLM, Sept. 1938. Six months: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 549. Nine months: Hamilton, Varney, and Wall, “Hospital Treatment,” p. 245. “An intelligent”: Potter, p. 57. Tentative release date: JP to SLM, Sept. 1938. Brief visit home: Wall, “Psychotherapy,” p. 554. “My time here”: JP to SLM, Sept. 1938. “Interest and curiosity”: Wall, “A Study,” p. 1400. “It was obvious”: Q. in Potter, p. 58. Date of release: JP to SLM, Sept. 1938: “The end of Sept. … around the 1st.” Most releases were scheduled for Fridays, so September 30 was the likely date, although Sande may not have picked him up until the next day, October 1. Jackson released: See Wall and Allen, “Results,” p. 478.

  Doctors falling under Jackson’s spell: One doctor, Henderson, in “JP,” p. 23, later admitted succumbing to “counter-transference.” “My recollection”: Q. in Potter, p. 57; see also Allen to Vallière, Sept. 2, 1963, showing that Allen felt the same way. “I remember you”: Wall to JP, Nov. 22, 1949, AAA. “A waste”: Wilcox. Summer seldom mentioned: There is one exception: JP looked up a friend he made at the hospital, a jeweler from New York named Thomas A. Dillon, and gave him a bowl similar to the one he had given Wall; see OC&T IV, p. 9. “Really furious”: Wheeler. Salemme institutionalized: Salemme; Wheeler. Jackson storming out: Wheeler. “I am very strongly”: THB to JP, Oct. 3, 1938. “I was worried”: Rita Benton to JP, Oct. 3, 1938; emphasis in the original. Busa and Horn: Busa; Horn. Kadish was one of the few who heard the full story; Kadish. “Had gone away”: Busa. Lehman, for example, knew nothing of the stay at Bloomingdale’s; Lehman. “Will you let Sande”: JP to “Willy or Walter,” June 21, 1938.

  Stella’s first grandchild: Jeremy Eleanor, born 1938. Date of application to WPA: JP to SLM, Sept. 1938: “Now what I want to try and do is come down and see how I stand with the project If I can get back on I will stay up here and come down a day or two each week, until around the 1st [of October].” Dies Committee: McKinzie, p. 158. “A hotbed”; “one more link”: McKinzie, p. 155. Midterm elections: McKinzie, p. 158; in the November elections, the Republicans gained eighty-one House seats and eight Senate seats. Cut in pay: From $23.86 per week to $91.00 every four weeks; FVOC, “The Genesis of JP,” p. 72. Hopkins resigning: McKinzie, p. 150. “From all appearances”: SLM to CCP, 1939, q. in FVOC, “The Genesis of JP,” pp. 72–73.

  Follow-up visits: “During the last weeks of treatment they are encouraged to visit their homes and resume their work”; Wall, “Psychotherapy,’” p. 554. Shying away from painting; concentration on sculpture: Strautin. Lithography: JP sent a lithograph to the Bentons for Christmas, 1938; OC&T IV, p. 224. “Story of my life”: OC&T 925, IV, p. 9. Bowl presented to Wall: OC&T 924, IV, p. 8. “The flight of man”: Wall to FVOC, Mar. 28, 1974, q. in OC&T IV, p. 8. Wall’s commentary: Wall to LK, Sept. 12,1963. Bowl sent to Bentons: OC&T 922, IV, p. 7; see SLM, int. by CG, c. 1956: After Bloomingdale’s, JP went abstract for the first time. Sande and Arloie hopeful: SLM to CCP, July 1941. Strautin: Kadish.

  Jackson meeting Marot: It is possible that they knew each other earlier, since Marot was friendly with the Bentons, especially Rita, long before JP arrived in New York. Talks with Marot: See SLM, int. by CG, c. 1956, in which Sande reports that JP used to go talk with Marot and Pratt “c. 1936.” Kadish: “I know that he would often be going to see her.” Marot’s clothes and spectacles: Cohen, “Helen Marot,” in Notable American Women, vol. 2, p. 500. “Didn’t pay much attention”: Sophia Mumford. “Strong-bottomed”: The word is Sophia Mumford’s for Caroline Pratt, but applies equally well to Stella. Marot’s build: Sophia Mumford. Marot’s birth: June 9, 1865; Cohen, “Helen Marot,” in Notable American Women, vol. 2, p. 499. “I want you”: Q. in Cohen, “Helen Marot,” in Notable American Women, vol. 2, p. 499. Tracts: For example, Handbook of Labor Literature (1898), American Trade Unions (1913), Creative Impulse in Industry (1918); for general history, see Cohen, “Helen Marot,” in Notable American Women, vol. 2, pp. 501–02. See also Dreier, n.p.; Goldmark, pp. 81–82, 155; “Labor Unions,” NYT, Oct. 4, 1914; Helen Marot, “Conquering Time” (letter to editor), NYT, Mar. 7, 1916; “Helen Marot,” NYT, June 4, 1940; “Organized 150,000 Women,” NYT, May 10, 1914; Pratt, pp. 1819; Schneiderman, pp. 80, 92, 96; “A Woman’s View of Labor,” NYT, Oct. 1, 1916.

  Grudging respect for Marot: Especially from Gompers; Sophia Mumford. Fellow reformers: Sophia Mumford. “[She] dropped”: Mumford, p. 247. Living with Pratt: Scott: Marot and Pratt owned separate brownstones on Twelfth Street, but Marot rented hers out and moved into Pratt’s house at 165 West Twelfth.

  Interest in psychology: Mumford, p. 247. Interest in anthropology: Cohen, “Helen Marot,” in Notable American Women, vol. 2, p. 500. “She had seen”: Mumford to FVOC, May 6, 1964, q. in FVOC, “
The Genesis of JP,” p. 93 n. 33, A lifetime without marriage or children had left Marot vulnerable to JP’s wayward-boy charms. Scott: “Helen felt that she had missed something by not marrying and made up for it by mothering everybody. Unlike the cool, dictatorial Pratt (Scott)—who disapproved of lullabies (Sophia Mumford)—Marot warmed quickly to strangers and, says Scott, ”was always briefing her friends on what they should do.”

  Marot’s relaxed appreciation: Sophia Mumford: She was far more relaxed than Pratt. “Swift insights”: Mumford to FVOC, May 6, 1964, q. in FVOC, “The Genesis of JP,” p. 93 n. 33, Sophia Mumford: “Caroline was interested in people as students. Helen was much more interested in people as people.” Carlton: “Caroline Pratt was enveloped in ignorance about sex.” When Sophia Mumford contemplated having a second child, Pratt was indignant. “If you really care about education,” Pratt said, “you won’t have another child. There are plenty of children in the world to educate,” at which point Marot broke in and said, “Oh, shut up, Caroline! It’s a biological urge and you don’t understand it”; q. by Sophia Mumford. Playing with Parrish: Also Jessie Wilcox Smith; Cohen, “Helen Marot,” in Notable American Women, vol. 2, p. 499. Marot on the Dial: For Marot’s involvement with the Dial, both the fortnightly Dial and its successor, see Mumford, p. 217, and Mumford, “Life on the Dial,” p. 4. Creative impulse”: Carlton.

  Interest in Sherrington and Herrick: Mumford; see also Mumford to FVOC, May 6, 1964, q. in FVOC, “The Genesis of JP,” p. 93 n. 33. Mumford, p. 247: She considered Sherrington’s 1906 book on reflexes, The Integrative Action of the Nervous System, “her bible.” Despite the sometimes extravagant claims of Jungian critics (e.g., Wolfe, “Jungian Aspects of JP’s Imagery,” p. 65), there is no evidence that Marot was interested in Jungian analysis. “Growth and development”: Marot’s last manuscript, which summarized her ideas on psychology, was called “Oneself: A Story of Arrested Growth and Development”; Cohen, “Helen Marot,” in Notable American Women, vol. 2, p. 501. Jackson’s openness with Marot: Busa; Scott. Friend and confidante: Lewis Mumford. Complaints about therapy: LK; Kadish; Southgate; Wilcox; etc. “[Therapy] never grew him”: Q. in Potter, p. 63.