Met Museum opens major joint exhibition of Lee Krasner and Jackson Pollock
New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art has opened a sweeping new exhibition giving painter Lee Krasner's own body of work equal billing alongside that of her husband, Jackson Pollock. Curated by David Breslin and Brinda Kumar, the show gathers over 120 works borrowed from more than 80 institutions worldwide.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has unveiled a large-scale exhibition titled "Past Continuous," devoted to abstract expressionist painter Lee Krasner and her husband, Jackson Pollock. Three years in the making, the show was curated by David Breslin and Brinda Kumar.
The exhibition brings together more than 120 works on loan from over 80 institutions around the world, including pieces by Modigliani, Matisse, Picasso and de Kooning. The curators say they deliberately avoided smoothing over the differences between the two artists' careers — Pollock's rise was sudden and spectacular, while Krasner produced steadily over a much longer span, continuing to work for two decades after her husband died in a car accident in 1956.
A fateful meeting
The couple first met at a landmark exhibition organized by artist John Graham at the McMillen Inc. gallery, a show now remembered for helping launch the careers of both Pollock and de Kooning. At the time, the socially well-connected Krasner was far better known in art circles than the reclusive Pollock.
Mutual influence
After moving to Long Island together in 1945, the two artists spent years creating side by side, each shaping the other's development. The curators note that Krasner introduced Pollock to the work of Henri Matisse, who became a major influence on both, especially following MoMA's extensive 1951 Matisse retrospective.
The curators say they deliberately steered away from a direct "compare and contrast" approach, instead letting visitors encounter each artist on their own terms. The exhibition's title, "Past Continuous," is drawn from a series of late paintings by Krasner, each named after a different verb tense, reflecting the idea that the past continually feeds into the present and future.
Despite real recognition — Krasner was one of very few women artists to receive a solo retrospective at MoMA, and her works have sold for as much as $10m — she has largely remained in her husband's shadow, a legacy the curators attribute in part to the gender politics of the era.
