AIC's 43rd Annual Meeting

Jackson Pollock's Sea Change is one of very few paintings by this seminal figure in public collections in the Northwestern USA. Painted in 1947, Sea Change was one of a group of works marking Pollock's departure from brushwork and the colorful symbolic abstractions of 1946, in favor of a new method of painting. Francis O'Connor described this moment as Pollock's "first sustained exploration of the pouring technique”. One characteristic that makes Sea Change particularly fascinating is the fact that it contains evidence of Pollock's earlier style "submerged” beneath his newly embraced technique. Close examination of the painting reveals an extraordinary surface topography of colorful brushed patterns and forms that were later obscured by a dense web of scattered gravel and poured black and metallic paint. In the seven years leading up to Pollock's death, Peggy Guggenheim made a remarkable series of gifts of the artist's paintings to museums and colleges across America and around the world. Seattle was one the beneficiaries of Guggenheim's generosity, with Sea Change being pledged to the Seattle Art Museum in 1955 and formally entering the museum collection in 1958. By the 1970s, the inherent fragility of the painting had become apparent, with losses of gravel, and canvas distortions caused by the flimsy strainer and contracting, thick paint. Concerns about the deterioration led to conservation treatment in 1977, including attaching the painting to a honeycomb panel support and varnishing with an isobutyl methacrylate coating. The objective of the recent treatment of Sea Change was to remove the varnish to bring the surface closer to that which was crafted by Pollock. Varnish removal tests revealed that Pollock's colors from the first stage of painting are characterized by a rather lean, matte surface, whereas the overlying poured metallic and black paints were more medium-rich and glossy. Extensive tests for varnish removal were undertaken with conventional aromatic solvents and naphthalene depleted Exxon solvent ND150 and these tests will be described in the presentation. A small number of samples were taken as cross-sections from the tacking margins and the edges of gravel losses on the face of Sea Change. Samples were analyzed at the Getty Conservation Institute and the results enabled us to reconstruct Pollock's palette for both campaigns of painting. These samples also elucidated the layer structure and provided information on the painting's binding medium. The concurrent J. Paul Getty Museum/GCI treatment and studies of Pollock's Mural provided invaluable comparative material. The technical study considerably enhanced our understanding of the way Pollock produced Sea Change. In the past, our characterization of the way Pollock executed drip paintings may have been defined by notions of automatic process and a spontaneous gestural technique. Close study of this painting and recent studies of other Pollock paintings, however, advances our understanding of the degree to which he also incorporated less spontaneous approaches into his array of working methods. Here, Pollock re-worked an existing paint surface, revealing some earlier forms and obscuring others, intervening with a scattering of pebbles and poured color and then, finally, refining the composition with carefully positioned spots of artists' color applied straight from the tube. This collaborative treatment and research project resulted in the recovery of a more appropriate surface for Sea Change and the technical study enhanced understanding of this important moment in Pollock's career, as he took his canvas off the easel and onto the floor.