Film, lecture will complement Butler’s display of Pollock work

His life was depicted in the 2000 Oscar-winning film ‘Pollock.’

YOUNGSTOWN — The Butler is moving quickly to let the public view its newly acquired Jackson Pollock painting.

“Silver and Black” will go on display Dec. 26 in the Beeghly-Schaff Gallery of the art museum at 524 Wick Ave.

“We will present it in such a way as to educate the community as to who this man was,” said Lou Zona, director of the Butler.

The exhibition will include a film made by German photographer Hans Namuth in the 1950s in which Pollock paints while explaining his thought processes. Statements by art critics also will be displayed.

Pollock was born in 1912 in Cody, Wyo., and grew up in Arizona and California. He began to study painting in 1929 at the Art Students League in New York City.

Throughout the 1930s, Pollock worked in the manner of Regionalist painter Thomas Hart Benton, under whom he studied in New York. He also was influenced by Mexican muralist painter Diego Rivera, as well as by aspects of surrealism, a style espoused at the time.

By the mid-1940s, the painter had adopted an abstract manner that led to his nonobjective style. Later, he abandoned the easel for his now-famous drip style of painting, in which the canvas was laid on the ground.

Pollock’s greatest works include “Blue Poles” (1952), a 7-by 16-foot abstract, and “Male and Female” (1942). He married artist Lee Krasner in 1945. The couple left New York City that year and moved to eastern Long Island, where Pollock lived until his death in a car accident in 1956.

He deteriorated into heavy alcohol abuse in his later years. His life was depicted in the 2000 Oscar-winning film, “Pollock.”

“Silver and Black” is in stark contrast to the last high-profile acquisition of the Butler: Norman Rockwell’s “Lincoln the Railsplitter.”

The Butler purchased the Rockwell at auction for $1.7 million in 2007. Unlike the abstract Pollock, it is a realistic work depicting a young Abraham Lincoln carrying an ax and reading a book while walking through a field.

Zona will give a gallery talk about Pollock and the acquisition of “Silver and Black” at 2 p.m. Jan. 10 in the Butler’s Beecher Center Auditorium. The event is free and open to the public. Seating will be on a first-come, first-served basis.

The Butler is open 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday and noon to 4 p.m. Sunday. Admission and parking are free.