Number 1 (Lavender Mist) is a masterpiece created by an abstract expressionist artist Jackson Pollock in 1950. Number 61 (Rust and Blue) was created by the artist Mark Rothko who also belonged to the abstract expressionism art movement. The most apparent common feature of these two pictures is that both of them are non-representational, meaning that they do not depict something that could be easily recognized, such as people, animals, or nature. At first sight, an unprepared viewer could barely understand the purpose and the hidden meaning of these pictures.
Pollock, Rothko, and many other abstract expressionists utilized the same method of painting. This method includes dripping paint onto an unstretched canvas lying on the floor (Joselit 9). The gestures of the painter are not random; they are “highly controlled” and even resemble a dance (Joselit 9). Therefore, another similitude Number 1 and Number 61 is that they illustrate drip painting since they are created by paint poured on the canvas.
The third significant similarity of these masterpieces is that Pollock and Rothko created them not to express some particular idea, depict a particular object, or raise a particular question. Instead of this, the artists were painting with psychic automatism; they expressed their internal feelings and emotions. While creating these pictures, painters were not guided by any moral concerns and experienced an “absence of any control exercised by reason” (Kaur 14). Indeed, while looking at these two paintings, it becomes clear that their authors tried to express something more profound than the objective reality; they show something that could be understood only intuitively.
Another issue that should be discussed concerning Pollock’s Number 1 and Rothko’s Number 61 is a picture plane. These pictures are flat. The idea of flatness was actively promoted by the American art critic Clement Greenberg. Greenberg argued that flatness is what distinguishes pictures from other forms of art. In his view, for abstract pictures, it was essential to be deprived of depth and be two-dimensional. Number 1 and Number 61 entirely satisfy this Clement Greenberg’s view on modern art.
The authors of the discussed paintings also emphasize the importance of texture. For instance, Mark Rothko used layered coloring to create an impression that Number 61 is lit from the inside. Number 61 is not rich in colors; instead, it has a lot of hardly perceptible shades, some haziness that makes this artwork look deep. From this, it could be inferred that Rothko paid a lot of attention to the colors used in the painting.
Jackson Pollock, on the contrary, emphasized the texture of his Number 1 over the colors. Ironically, in the Lavender Mist, there are a lot of colors, including black, white, yellow, pink, brown, and yellow, but no lavender color. In fact, while looking at this Pollock’s painting, the abundance of color is not the first thing that catches an eye. The web created by the meticulous gestures of the author is much more critical than the deepness of colors. It seems that this web is tated but not drawn by brushes and paint.
To conclude, Jackson Pollock’s Number 1 (Lavender Mist) and Mark Rothko’s Number 61 (Rust and Blue) look completely different but have a lot in common from style to drawing methods. The similarities discussed above are attributable to the fact that both artists are representatives of the abstract expressionism art movement. At the same time, Pollock emphasizes the texture of the picture, while Rothko devotes specific attention to the play of color.