Even as a high school student in the 1920s, Jackson Pollock understood the value of art and culture. The young upstart and his friends caused a “classroom scandal” when they published a polemic criticising their school’s “overemphasis on athletics” and “disrespect” of the humanities. They called it the Journal of Liberty, implying that they saw humanities and the arts as essential for realising the American ideal.
Review: Blue Poles: Jackson Pollock, Gough Whitlam and the Painting that Changed Australia – Tom McIlroy (Hachette)
