[HN Gopher] Jacksonpollock.org (2003)
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Jacksonpollock.org (2003)
        
       Author : memalign
       Score  : 476 points
       Date   : 2025-02-08 21:22 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (jacksonpollock.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (jacksonpollock.org)
        
       | memalign wrote:
       | The page looks blank so click/tap to fill it in...!
        
       | codr7 wrote:
       | Cool, but needs color.
        
         | NAHWheatCracker wrote:
         | Click and it changes colors.
        
           | KTibow wrote:
           | Checking the source, you could also use your keyboard (eg 0-9
           | is a grayscale palette).
        
       | cbarrick wrote:
       | Fun thing!
       | 
       | The double-click to clear is too sensitive for me. I keep
       | accidentally clearing when I try to go fast.
        
         | lupire wrote:
         | Don't click.
        
           | sertsa wrote:
           | Clicking changes the color of the paint. Not clicking would
           | be pretty monochromatic and not very Pollock-y
        
             | alt227 wrote:
             | Also press the keyboard for colours. b=blue, r=red etc...
        
       | Zanni wrote:
       | Fun, but more suggestive of Steadman (illustrator of Fear and
       | Loathing in Las Vegas and other things) than Pollock:
       | https://www.npr.org/2014/04/27/307285367/artist-ralph-steadm...
        
         | pkdpic wrote:
         | Agreed, super cool project. All it seems like it would need for
         | a full pollock vibe would be a color palette selector. And
         | maybe this audio track on loop and a transparent overlay of
         | animated cigarette smoke. Great url.
         | 
         | https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nmzppQU-lqA
        
           | zrail wrote:
           | Also maybe a random cigarette butt once in a while.
        
         | serf wrote:
         | I disagree.
         | 
         | Pollock used a lot of connected ink splotches, Steadman's
         | 'inkling' stuff is usually large white-space separated
         | splotches, an effect that is impossible with this tool.
         | 
         | also Steadman moved away from that eventually, whereas Pollock
         | leaned into it until death.
         | 
         | Moreover Pollocks' art _was_ the splotches, whereas it was
         | usually an accoutrement for Steadman around a different --
         | usually framed -- perspective.
        
       | hifikuno wrote:
       | Hah! I waited far too long for the page to load. It wasn't until
       | I moved my mouse to another window that I realized.
        
         | cjonas wrote:
         | Same here! Figured it was the HN hug of death and left.
        
       | tolerance wrote:
       | I know it's early but it's funny to note the difference between
       | the comments here so far and what the discussion was like in
       | 2020:
       | 
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24269430
        
         | randall wrote:
         | wow. that's awesome. i don't understand why but i'm happy.
        
         | milesrout wrote:
         | [flagged]
        
           | yieldcrv wrote:
           | It looks like people are more appreciate of everyone's
           | ability to express themselves adequately and garner influence
           | to share
           | 
           | very onbrand with how this debate has gone so far!
           | 
           | I'm glad
        
           | daneel_w wrote:
           | Of topics like these my father, a lover of all things art and
           | photography, would say: "It doesn't matter if it's bad, and
           | it doesn't matter that anyone can do it; he was the one who
           | did it first."
        
             | bigstrat2003 wrote:
             | I don't agree with your dad. Whether something is good (a
             | notoriously loaded question) and whether it's easy for
             | anyone to do themselves matter a great deal. Being the
             | first person to do something abhorrent would not be
             | praiseworthy, nor would being the first to do something
             | uninteresting. Pollock may well have been the first to do
             | what he did, but it is still low effort slop that any three
             | year old could trivially reproduce. Therefore he gets no
             | points for being first, because he didn't do something
             | worth doing to begin with.
        
               | noirbot wrote:
               | This feels unnecessarily harsh - I can understand
               | thinking Pollock shouldn't be as decorated or recognized,
               | but "not worth doing to begin with" seems to cast a
               | judgement on him having created something that feels
               | mean-sprited. It's not as if Pollock was causing harm to
               | others by making his pieces. I have plenty of friends who
               | work out their stresses and needs to create by making
               | things that will never be in a museum or sell for money.
               | They may not even qualify for your approval as "art".
               | Many are equally non-representational - just a mix of
               | colors that struck their mood that day on a canvas. That
               | doesn't mean they're not worth doing for them or maybe
               | for those who care about them and received a piece of
               | their work. I find some of them beautiful for reasons I
               | can't explain.
               | 
               | The critique of if Pollock should be canonized as "a
               | great artist" is and should be a different discussion. As
               | far as I know, he wasn't out there trying to get his
               | works in museums. Dismissing something he clearly cared
               | about and had passion for as a complete waste of his life
               | is insane to me. As pointed out elsewhere in this thread,
               | he was decidedly capable of other works that were more
               | representational, but decided that he wanted to express
               | himself in this way. This wasn't some hack with no other
               | skills who got lucky.
        
           | dang wrote:
           | Could you please follow the site guidelines when posting to
           | HN? They include:
           | 
           | " _Please don 't sneer_"
           | 
           | and
           | 
           | " _Please don 't post shallow dismissals, especially of other
           | people's work. A good critical comment teaches us
           | something._"
           | 
           | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
        
         | aqueueaqueue wrote:
         | There is a question as to whether it used SWF back in the day.
         | It is likely but also would Java Applets have still been an
         | option then?
        
           | rasso wrote:
           | I remember. It was written in Flash
        
           | jccalhoun wrote:
           | archive.org's cache of the 2003 version tried to download a
           | swf file. so it was flash
        
         | dang wrote:
         | Thanks! Macroexpanded:
         | 
         |  _Jackson Pollock_ -
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37876645 - Oct 2023 (2
         | comments)
         | 
         |  _Jacksonpollock.org (2003)_ -
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24269430 - Aug 2020 (151
         | comments)
        
       | yapyap wrote:
       | lol not gonna lie I thought it got the HN hug of death at first
        
       | amelius wrote:
       | Reminds me of the early days of Javascript when every other
       | website had a gimmick like this one.
        
       | cattown wrote:
       | People seem confused about the UI. You don't need to click, just
       | move. Most keys on the keyboard correspond to a color. Shift +
       | those keys sets the background.
       | 
       | I like it that there's no hint, it just rewards exploration and
       | experimentation.
        
         | cactusplant7374 wrote:
         | Clicking changes the color too.
        
         | macintux wrote:
         | Launching it on an iPad was a mystery. I assumed it was
         | suffering from the HN hug of death until I tried to swipe back.
        
           | Wistar wrote:
           | Me, too. Thought a script failed to fire on iPad/Safari.
        
       | Deprogrammer9 wrote:
       | it got old fast lol but for a few minutes I was into it.
        
       | quanto wrote:
       | What a wonderful demonstration of how a simple UI can create so
       | much joy. Utility to Kolmogorov complexity ratio is quite high on
       | this one.
        
       | every wrote:
       | I find it interesting that Pollock was a student of the American
       | Regionalist Thomas Hart Benton[1]. No two artists could have been
       | more unalike...
       | 
       | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Hart_Benton_(painter)
        
         | antgonzales wrote:
         | Jackson Pollock's style evolved throughout his life. The
         | Whitney had a show with his early works and it's nothing like
         | his splatter painting style we all know[1].
         | 
         | [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/26/nyregion/a-review-of-
         | men-...
        
       | marcus0x62 wrote:
       | I wonder what the art dealers in Who The #$&% Is Jackson
       | Pollack[0] would think of this?
       | 
       | 0 - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0487092
        
       | julianz wrote:
       | It's cool, but that's definitely a Ralph Steadman background
       | generator, much more than Pollock.
        
       | mmoustafa wrote:
       | Fun! Reminds me of spending a week in 2012 trying to find the
       | perfect blackboard chalk effect
       | http://mmoustafa.com/experiments/chalk/
       | 
       | After many experiments, the most realistic was painting a thick
       | line and then erasing tiny randomly sized rectangles out of it.
        
         | buggy6257 wrote:
         | I need this combined with Excalidraw somehow and I would be so
         | happy. There's something so viscerally satisfying about
         | chalkboards, even virtual. Thanks for this! You did a
         | phenomenal job on the chalk effect.
        
         | bleakenthusiasm wrote:
         | It looks really good. Like, really good. I have one thing that
         | throws me, though: if you keep drawing over the same section,
         | you don't get more coverage. It always looks like the first
         | pass. But I'm so surprised at how well this works to emulate
         | chalk.
        
           | KTibow wrote:
           | It seems the only thing that changes how covered a section is
           | the speed you go over it with.
        
         | revorad wrote:
         | This is so cool! It'd be even more fun if it had sound effects.
        
           | dmd wrote:
           | You're a monster.
        
         | gilleain wrote:
         | Hah I did something similar around the same time, using random
         | white/gray/black pixels (apparently, I don't remember any
         | details any more!)
         | 
         | https://gilleain.blogspot.com/2008/11/chalky.html
        
           | mmoustafa wrote:
           | That looks awesome!
        
       | timkpaine wrote:
       | In case anyone wants to do one themselves (and learn Clojure), I
       | think this was posted on HN previously:
       | https://tombooth.co.uk/painting-in-clojure/
        
       | msla wrote:
       | Here's a topic I don't see people engaging with: I could in
       | principle make the same kinds of completely abstract paintings
       | Pollock did, but if I do it, it won't be art because I'm not in
       | the art world. I have no access to galleries, I have no patrons,
       | and I generally don't move in those circles, so I have no ability
       | to be taken seriously for doing it.
        
         | plufz wrote:
         | Do you think simply copying a 70 year old idea would make you a
         | world famous artist if you had more connections in art?
         | 
         | (Not that abstract painting really describes what made Pollock
         | famous, action painting is obviously it.)
        
           | msla wrote:
           | > Do you think simply copying a 70 year old idea would make
           | you a world famous artist if you had more connections in art?
           | 
           | No, I meant like Pollock in terms of being completely non-
           | representational.
        
             | ggm wrote:
             | There are now suggestions he buried representational
             | subjects in the field. Suggestions his bipolar made it
             | happen and then get buried.
             | 
             | I tend to think it's post hoc reasoning by bored art
             | critics and Pareidolia.
        
             | schneems wrote:
             | I think part of what makes an artist stand out in a medium
             | like this is that they are able to stand out in a medium
             | like this.
             | 
             | Going and seeing something like "the fountain" (Duchamp) is
             | surely accompanied by many people remarking "I could have
             | made that" and it could be true, but they didn't. And
             | that's the difference.
             | 
             | To some degree that accessibility makes some of these
             | things even more interesting.
             | 
             | I brought up a Dadaism piece on purpose. In fascism, one
             | tool of the leaders was to declare some art pure and
             | acceptable and some as "not art." Dadaism was a rebuke of
             | the idea: that authority can or cannot tell us what art is
             | and isn't.
             | 
             | Dadaism is intentionally absurdist. And it's that quality
             | that many would use to discredit it, is the very thing that
             | makes it so powerful (to some).
             | 
             | Not saying that pollock is playing with absurdism, but
             | saying that sometimes the things that make something "not
             | art" or "not interesting" to one person are the things that
             | elevate it to another.
             | 
             | Not sure if that's what you were asking, but that's a riff
             | I was inspired to share.
        
         | jonahx wrote:
         | It would be still be art but no, you wouldn't be taken
         | seriously.
         | 
         | To some extent succeeding at art is by definition succeeding in
         | those circles, whether through politics, a chance patron or
         | gallery owner fixating on you, raw unignorable talent, etc. A
         | related definition is succeeding by sheer popularity and fame,
         | like a Banksy, though he's succeeded in both ways. I don't
         | think this insight undermines the art world wholesale, though
         | it definitely suggests (correctly) that luck plays role, that
         | not all great artists succeed, and that not all successful
         | artists are great. Most games in life are like this.
        
       | Waterluvian wrote:
       | I want this but multitouch so badly.
        
       | Sn0wCoder wrote:
       | The Paper.js library is neat if you like this site (found it
       | looking through the source). http://paperjs.org/
        
       | CaramelGrudge wrote:
       | I've played a lot with this years ago. Could have been between 10
       | and 15 years back even! Didn't know it still existed. Thanks for
       | sharing
        
       | vasco wrote:
       | My portrait https://imgur.com/a/SKrexZb
        
       | femto wrote:
       | On a tangent, the floor of Pollock's studio is an artwork in its
       | own right:
       | 
       | https://aaqeastend.com/contents/aaq-portfolio-jackson-polloc...
        
         | dang wrote:
         | Wow, that would make a great HN submission in its own right--
         | though not anytime soon! one has to let the hivemind caches
         | clear first.
        
           | TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
           | On the other hand, when brick and mortar stores of the same
           | kind are located near each other they all sell more.
           | 
           | And we often see two of the same topics thriving on the HN
           | front page.
        
             | DyslexicAtheist wrote:
             | say no more.
        
             | dang wrote:
             | > we often see two of the same topics thriving on the HN
             | front page
             | 
             | Most often that would be a failure on our part. But it's
             | good for the mods to fail sometimes.
        
       | adamredwoods wrote:
       | I absolutely love this and here's why: many people who criticize
       | art as being "child's doodles" lack the experience and process of
       | art. Education raises all boats. This is that type of simple
       | education.
       | 
       | So now, I hope every here tries to make their own Pollock art.
       | 
       | https://www.moma.org/artists/4675-jackson-pollock
        
         | ilbeeper wrote:
         | Because Pollock would smash it with a masterpiece right out of
         | his cellphone? This is cute but not a great device to reveal
         | the truth to the uneducated
        
           | adamredwoods wrote:
           | Nope. To think to is create. I want more people to think.
           | Trying to make a masterpiece with this is not the point.
        
           | InsideOutSanta wrote:
           | I think what he would do is better than what most others
           | would.
           | 
           | This reminds me of something that happened to me in the early
           | 90s. I went to a local computer show (where local
           | distributors would show new hardware) with a friend who's an
           | artist. There was a booth with a color Mac, probably an LC or
           | something like that, running Mac Paint. People were doodling
           | on it, playing around with the spray can and the text tool,
           | and it looked like random stuff thrown on a canvas. Not
           | having a computer at home, my friend was curious, and queued
           | to play with it.
           | 
           | When my friend got a turn on the Mac, first time on a Mac
           | using Mac Paint, he made a drawing that genuinely looked like
           | a piece of art. If there had been a printer nearby, I could
           | have printed it out and put it on my wall, and nobody would
           | have thought that this was a somebody's first time using Mac
           | Paint.
           | 
           | Art is a genuine skill, and you will see the difference
           | between an artist and a random person regardless of the
           | canvas they use.
           | 
           | I guess this also reminds me of the introduction of the
           | Amiga, with Warhol using the paint can to fill in sections of
           | a photo of Debbie Harry. Technically, this is something
           | everybody can do, but Warhol knew which colors to pick, which
           | sections to color, and which choices to make to create
           | something that actually looks great.
        
       | osehgol wrote:
       | absolutely wonderful, thank you
        
       | msuvakov wrote:
       | ___                        ___                     ___
       | ___               /  /\           ___        /  /\      ___
       | /  /\         /  /\             /  /::|         /__/\      /  /:/
       | /__/\        /  /::\       /  /::\           /  /:|:|
       | \__\:\    /  /:/      \  \:\      /  /:/\:\     /__/:/\:\
       | /  /:/|:|__       /  /::\  /  /:/        \__\:\    /  /:/  \:\
       | _\_ \:\ \:\       /__/:/_|::::\   __/  /:/\/ /__/:/         /
       | /::\  /__/:/ \__\:\ /__/\ \:\ \:\      \__\/  /~~/:/  /__/\/:/~~
       | \  \:\        /  /:/\:\ \  \:\ /  /:/ \  \:\ \:\_\/            /
       | /:/   \  \::/      \  \:\      /  /:/__\/  \  \:\  /:/   \
       | \:\_\:\             /  /:/     \  \:\       \  \:\    /__/:/
       | \  \:\/:/     \  \:\/:/            /__/:/       \__\/        \
       | \:\   \__\/          \  \::/       \  \::/             \__\/
       | \__\/                   \__\/         \__\/
        
         | dang wrote:
         | (I took out several dozen lines of whitespace from this post.
         | Looks like the green graphic didn't come through.)
        
           | msuvakov wrote:
           | Thanks. It seems that some UTF-8 characters are not accepted
           | as part of the comment. Anyone who wants to see the rabbit
           | should check the page source :)
        
       | emoprincejack wrote:
       | why is this front page on HN
        
         | Deprogrammer9 wrote:
         | The CIA runs hacker news.
        
           | dang wrote:
           | Well that made me lol! (Edit: oh. now that i've seen
           | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42987770 it's not so
           | funny; too bad)
           | 
           | FWIW the CIA does not run Hacker News. (that I know of)
        
             | tptacek wrote:
             | You believe what we want you to believe.
        
         | bdangubic wrote:
         | if you have to ask this question you are in a wrong place :)
        
       | helsinki wrote:
       | Make this a Vision Pro app, please.
        
       | rexpop wrote:
       | Fun fact! Jackson Pollock, along with other abstract
       | expressionists, was a CIA propaganda asset!
       | 
       | The CIA believed that abstract expressionism, with its unbound
       | and individualistic style, could be associated with American
       | freedoms, so they secretly funded the "Congress for Cultural
       | Freedom", an anti-communist advocacy group that promoted American
       | arts and culture, including abstract expressionism, through
       | international art shows and publications.
       | 
       | Art or writings that touched on US racism (Pollock was
       | contemporaneous with numerous lynchings) and imperialism
       | (Guatemala, Iran, Greece, Korea) were, of course, passed over.
       | 
       | Ever since I learned this, I have lost all emotional appreciation
       | for his works. While before they seemed free, now they seem
       | cheap.
        
         | Deprogrammer9 wrote:
         | They killed him knowing his art would skyrocket in price. They
         | still have his art on their walls to this day.
        
           | rexpop wrote:
           | This is a vague and baseless conspiracy theory.
        
         | 0x1ceb00da wrote:
         | It was a money laundering scheme.
        
         | dang wrote:
         | Related:
         | 
         |  _Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)_ -
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36155204 - June 2023 (332
         | comments)
         | 
         | https://www.openculture.com/2023/10/how-the-cia-secretly-use...
         | 
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10462602
        
         | skrebbel wrote:
         | > Ever since I learned this, I have lost all emotional
         | appreciation for his works. While before they seemed free, now
         | they seem cheap.
         | 
         | I don't understand this. Because he got paid for it, the work
         | is cheap? Do you think he would've made different works if the
         | CIA hadn't funded his art shows? I struggle to imagine what a
         | Pollock "about" racism would look like, and how the CIA would
         | notice that it's about racism.
         | 
         | I mean you do you, I don't mean to tell you you can't dislike
         | someone's art. I just really don't get it :D
        
           | alt227 wrote:
           | It reeks of the same stench as cancel culture. Once some
           | people have seen a connection to something they dont like,
           | they just cant bring themselves to enjoy that thing anymore.
           | I guess those sorts of people like to fixate on what they
           | hate.
        
         | bazoom42 wrote:
         | CIA also promoted jazz music which was very effective in
         | getting European intellectuals and artists to appreciate
         | American culture more.
         | 
         | But I don't see how that should make you appreciate jazz music
         | itself any more or less.
        
         | hermitcrab wrote:
         | When I look at ludicrously priced 'conceptual art' and
         | 'abstract expressionism' I see decadence, not freedom.
        
       | Deprogrammer9 wrote:
       | Pollock's art is not just random splashes but a sophisticated
       | interaction of movement, gravity, and fluid dynamics, creating
       | fractal-like structures. This fractal nature might contribute to
       | why people find his work visually compelling--it resonates with
       | patterns we see in nature.
        
         | jfengel wrote:
         | What are your thoughts if I don't find it compelling? Is that
         | the end of it, or is there some reason for me to keep seeking
         | emotional resonance in it?
        
           | bigstrat2003 wrote:
           | I mean, it's just random splashes. I don't think there's a
           | reason to convince yourself that there is some compelling
           | hidden meaning to it.
        
           | mturmon wrote:
           | https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/29103-try-to-be-one-of-
           | thos...
        
             | jfengel wrote:
             | That is a really good point. I've put a lot of effort into
             | understanding things that didn't appeal and some of them
             | are now very meaningful to me. I thought literature was
             | absurd and now I direct Shakespeare plays.
             | 
             | So... I'll think on that.
        
           | noirbot wrote:
           | It's not any more random than where you happen to be standing
           | in relation to the clouds at sunset. There's plenty of days
           | that doesn't have any emotional resonance to me, but some
           | days it does. I wouldn't dwell on it, and if you happen to
           | see a piece in person some day, maybe it strikes you
           | differently.
        
             | jfengel wrote:
             | I haven't spent much time with Pollock, but I've seen an
             | awful lot of Rothkos. Very different style but similar
             | levels of "that looks like it took no thought and has
             | nothing to say".
             | 
             | I'm content to say Rothko isn't for me, but I'll reserve
             | judgment on Pollock until I can spend more time in those
             | galleries.
        
         | psytrancefan wrote:
         | This app is as interesting as Pollocks's art. A few moments of
         | "interesting" then you close the browser and move on.
        
           | UberFly wrote:
           | Pollock's "art" is generous. The guy splashed random paint
           | around. Buyers would come in and point to the section that
           | "spoke" to them. He'd cut out that section, sign it, and
           | extract thousands from these idiots. Actually, good for him
           | come to think of it.
        
             | criddell wrote:
             | Idiots, eh? I'm guessing most of those original buyers
             | don't have a lot of regret for buying something that made
             | them happy.
        
         | umvi wrote:
         | To me this reads like someone praising the exquisite quality of
         | the invisible Egyptian cotton forming the emperor's clothes
        
         | chefandy wrote:
         | This is a fun toy. I have no problem naming toys after the
         | serious people and things that inspired it. For all I know,
         | that is exactly what the author of this toy intended to do. Toy
         | isn't even a denigrating term -- play is critically important
         | to many things, especially in visual art.
         | 
         | What gets old is the hubris of the tech world thinking that an
         | artist's intention and methods boil down to a superficial
         | 'style'-- devoid of granular stroke-by-stroke intention,
         | context, or meaning which you can apply to any arbitrary
         | subject or setting to effectively create new works by that
         | artist.
        
       | amadeuspagel wrote:
       | Beautiful. Minimal interface. The domain itself is the only
       | necessary explanation.
        
       | matthberg wrote:
       | It's configurable too!
       | 
       | Numbers set grey scale.
       | 
       | Letters set colors (b=blue, r=red, y=yellow, etc).
       | 
       | Mouse click sets random color.
       | 
       | Spacebar or double-click resets canvas.
       | 
       | I didn't discover this, comment stolen from previous discussion
       | (thank you Cactus2018!):
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24284711
        
         | SeanLuke wrote:
         | Somehow something I typed changed the background color. But I
         | don't know how.
        
           | novosel wrote:
           | ctrl+b
        
             | alt227 wrote:
             | Ctrl+b brings up the bookmark toolbar in Firebox.
        
       | thesparks wrote:
       | Can someone with ChatGPT Pro use Operator and ask it to move the
       | mouse to create a beautiful painting and see what happens?
        
       | krism wrote:
       | Amazing!!!
        
       | LAC-Tech wrote:
       | Can someone help me? I can't get to the main page, but it draws
       | what looks like a toddlers art work when I try and use it.
       | 
       | Firefox on Linux.
        
       | xeonax wrote:
       | This reminded me of my Show HN
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41791443
        
       | ChrisArchitect wrote:
       | Based on Stamen Design's _Splatter_ https://stamen.com/splatter-
       | now-re-available-for-download-15...
       | https://github.com/stamen/splatter
        
         | tomgp wrote:
         | I remember when the Jacksonpollock.org first came online there
         | was a bit of drama around the fact that Miltos Manetas had
         | taken Stamen's original Flash file (well known within the flash
         | community at the time but not so much outside) and re-hosted it
         | without credit or permission. They sorted it out and Stamen
         | were credited in the end but it opened my eyes to how much of
         | contemporary art it's actually marketing. (With reference here
         | to Manetas not Pollock)
        
       | chris_wot wrote:
       | Has anyone seen Blue Poles? It nearly brought down a government.
        
         | hermitcrab wrote:
         | "The National Gallery of Australia (NGA) purchased Blue Poles
         | in 1973 for US$1.3 million."
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Poles
         | 
         | There is one born every minute.
        
       | wistlo wrote:
       | Showed this to my 16 year old and she said, "oh, yeah, I've got
       | that bookmarked."
       | 
       | "You should also try Mondrian and Me."
       | 
       | I did, and it's as you would expect:
       | 
       | https://mondrianandme.com/
       | 
       | More fun than panda dataframes, at least at this hour.
        
       | samdung wrote:
       | Since we are on Pollock ...
       | 
       | https://daily.jstor.org/was-modern-art-really-a-cia-psy-op/
        
       | kilroy123 wrote:
       | How cool to see this. This last year, I helped the artist fix
       | this and bring this back to life. Makes me smile to see it here.
       | :)
       | 
       | Here is the Artist's home page, btw:
       | 
       | https://manetas.com/timeline.com/en/
        
       | smrtkobylam wrote:
       | Great! Is this website funded by CIA as well?
        
       | qoez wrote:
       | 2003? Canvas wasn't a thing until the 2010s
        
         | jccalhoun wrote:
         | I went on archive.org and it looks like the 2003 version used
         | flash.
        
       | fitsumbelay wrote:
       | the main reason why I el-you-vee love this is that it's what my
       | first sketches in processing ( minus the obligatory "random"
       | color generation on every mouse click ( somehow those colors
       | where never really random ) ) plus some algo for extra splotches
       | around curves, it looks like. a very simple starting point
       | elevated to a super cool thing.
        
       | metalman wrote:
       | someone, once, attached different paint brushes to the branches
       | of a tree, that could touch a canvas placed below. The completely
       | random, but compelling results, resemble nothing so much as a
       | pollock one of the few mad artists that I admire there work. Also
       | have lived with paintings done in his studio by an X's relative,
       | who was attempting the same style, but in no way achiving what
       | pollock himself did. I do have a few random unknown artist works,
       | that come close, and have a partial back story on two, and they
       | were also, mad! Mad but precious, and in this time there is
       | little physical and financial room for people and the subculters
       | they create to thrive, and so we are impoverished. The app is
       | cute, but it trivialises what was a huge reach into the unknown.
        
       | ascorbic wrote:
       | It's a lot of fun building these kinds of things. I made this a
       | few years ago and got obsessed with modelling bezier curves for
       | individual bristles and tweaking the tiny details of blend modes
       | https://react-artboard.netlify.app/
        
         | viggity wrote:
         | If splines/beziers are of any interest to you, I could not
         | recommend these videos from Freya Holmer enough.
         | 
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvPPXbo87ds
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVwxzDHniEw
        
       | BeFlatXIII wrote:
       | This brings back fond memories of playing around in KidPix in
       | elementary school.
        
       | hermitcrab wrote:
       | To think that someone actually made a lucrative career out of the
       | analogue version of this. I suppose it was one step above hanging
       | a blank canvas with a pretentious caption underneath.
        
         | profunctor wrote:
         | Have you seen them in real life? They are much more interesting
         | in person.
        
         | codingdave wrote:
         | He did not make a lucrative career out of his painting. He was
         | fairly poor... just famous. And not even that until the last
         | few years of his life.
        
           | hermitcrab wrote:
           | It says at
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Bacon_(artist) :
           | 
           | "By 1989 Bacon was the most expensive living artist after one
           | of his triptychs sold at Sotheby's for over US$6 million."
           | 
           | And:
           | 
           | "He died of a heart attack on 28 April 1992, aged 82. He
           | bequeathed his estate (then valued at PS11 million) to his
           | heir and sole legatee John Edwards."
           | 
           | Sounds quite lucrative to me.
        
             | codingdave wrote:
             | That would totally prove your point _if_ this post was
             | about Francis Bacon. It isn 't.
        
               | hermitcrab wrote:
               | Oops! ;0)
        
         | gizajob wrote:
         | "To me they look like bits of old lace" - Francis Bacon
        
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