Lesson Overview:
Students will understand the influences that one artistic genre has on another—specifically, the similarities between the New York School poets and Abstract Expressionist visual artists. After examining work by Jackson Pollock, students will analyze poetry by Frank O'Hara, and imitate his style in their original work. Students will also compare Franz Kline's artistic process to that of Frank O'Hara. They will learn to enhance their writing via the use of specific details, attention to diction, and through revision based on a peer writing workshop.
Length of Lesson:
Three 45-minute class periods
Notes:
This lesson is particularly suitable for grades 9-10.
Instructional Objectives:
Students will:
- discuss the history of the New York School of poets and visual artists.
- discuss and interpret work by Jackson Pollock.
- analyze and interpret Frank O'Hara's "The Day Lady Died".
- compare visual artist Franz Kline's process with that of O'Hara.
- apply O'Hara's stylistic techniques to their own original work.
- workshop their peers' poetry.
- revise their work based on self and peer feedback.
Supplies:
- Computer with Internet access and projector or slides and slide projector or copies of prints of Franz Kline's and Jackson Pollock's work (as detailed in below and in instructional plan)
- Copies of Frank O'Hara's poem, "The Day Lady Died," one for each student: (available in The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara (see Sources) or on the Web site of WNYC: New York Public Radio)
- Print or slide of Painting No. 7 by Franz Kline (see The Guggenheim Collection's Web site)
- Blank pieces of paper
- Pen and journal
Instructional Plan:
Warm Up
Tell students to take out a piece of paper and draw a tree. When finished, share with students the following quote by American artist Jackson Pollock: "When I'm in the painting, I don't understand what I'm doing; it's only after a sort of 'get acquainted' period that I see what I've been about." Ask students what they think a painter might mean by this quote. Ask students how the process of creating might be different for the artist if they don't have a set goal of what the end result should be. Would the task feel more or less daunting? More or less freeing? Ask students how they would have felt if you had asked them to draw whatever they wanted rather than a tree. What would be a more accurate depiction of what they are thinking about or feeling?
Introducing the New York School
Show students a print or slide of the painting Lavender Mist by Jackson Pollock. (Note: This painting is included in the Abstract Expressionist Artists interactive slideshow.) Explain to students that Jackson Pollock was considered an "action painter," a term that describes painters who are completely physically involved in the creation of their art. Pollock would spread canvas on the floor and walk around it, dripping and pouring commercial house paint onto the canvas in layers of lines and splatters. Unlike other artists who painted on easels, Pollock's placement of the canvas on the floor allowed him to move around the canvas freely, using full-body rhythmic movements to control the paint in gestures akin to dancing. You may wish to show students a photograph of Pollock in the process of painting on the National Gallery of Art: Jackson Pollock Web site.
Ask students if the paint drips seem random or if they create a kind of rhythm. Explain to students that reproductions of Pollock's work do not best represent the infinite tones created from the intricate way the paint was layered. However, students should note the way the seemingly random drips of paint create a rhythmically unified atmosphere. Ask students how they would describe that atmosphere. Inform students that, similar to the Surrealists, Pollock was interested in the role of chance in the creation of art, but unlike the Surrealists, he exercised control of his movements over the canvas. (See the ARTSEDGE lesson Dalí & Desnos: Surrealism in Poetry and Art for more on the Surrealist movement.)
Inform students that Pollock was one of several artists identified as the Abstract Expressionists, also known as artists in the "New York School", an artistic movement that developed in the 1940s and 1950s and comprised artists who valued individual expression, spontaneity, and improvisation. Artists such as Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Robert Motherwell, Franz Kline, and Mark Rothko believed that conventional artistic styles and subject matter could not sufficiently depict their individual visions. Have students view the Abstract Expressionist Artists interactive slideshow, and allow them time to take notes and discuss their observations.
Poets like John Ashbery, James Schuyler, Barbara Guest, Kenneth Koch, and Frank O'Hara—who were living in New York at the time—greatly admired the visual artists' nonconformity and daring, and believed their approach to writing poetry shared a similar freeing quality. Just as the Abstract Expressionists engaged in action painting, these writers created poems concerned not with representation of experience. Rather, their poems were experiences in themselves-places of action. Reminiscent of Pollock's quote regarding his artistic process, Ashbery once said, "I may be writing for awhile without knowing what I'm writing about. I begin writing with no clear idea of what I'm going to say. In that sense, writing a poem is a voyage towards some unknown point—and perhaps never arriving there."
Ask students if they recall other artistic movements that comprised artists working in various media (i.e., French Surrealism, the Harlem Renaissance). Ask students how they think artists working in one place could contribute to the development of art movements. (See the ARTSEDGE activity, Why Harlem? for information on the role of place in the proliferation of a creative movement.) Point out to students that both Schuyler and O'Hara worked at the Museum of Modern Art, and all five aforementioned poets wrote for the magazine Art News at some point. Moreover, many of these visual artists and poets socialized together and worked collaboratively to create various artworks.
Frank O'Hara: Seemingly Random
Ask students to take out a piece of paper and describe an average day in their lives. When they're finished, tell them they can set this paper aside for now.
Pass out copies of O'Hara's poem, "The Day Lady Died", which is available on the Web site of WNYC: New York Public Radio. After reading the poem aloud, ask students how this poem depicts the process of the poet's mind as it is thinking in a similar way that the paint drips of Jackson Pollock depicts the artist's creative process. Point out that although the poem is a kind of elegy (or a poem lamenting one deceased) for Billie Holiday (known as "Lady Day"), the jazz singer's death isn't mentioned until the last five lines of the poem; thus the poet is recounting the process whereby he learns
of her death.
Tell students to think about a day when they heard bad news and/or they were greatly affected by an event emotionally. Have them take out a piece of paper and write down everything they remember about that day without mentioning the bad news or event at all. When finished, ask students to compare the passage they wrote about an average day in their lives to the one they just wrote. Is one more detailed than the other? Does one contain more vivid detail than the other? Most likely, individuals will remember the circumstances surrounding a tragic event in more detail than an average day, and those details will carry more significance and emotional weight than the details of an average day.
Ask students why they think O'Hara ended the poem with the lines "and I stopped breathing." (Point out that O'Hara's poem depicts how daily life is disrupted by tragedy; the poet's list of mundane events must come to a close when the normal routine is also disrupted.)
Ask students the following: Do the details in the poem seem random? Why would the poet include such seemingly random details in an elegiac poem? How often do they find it difficult to talk about tragic moments in their lives? How is O'Hara's poem a reflection of this difficulty? How does the inclusion of so many proper names affect you as readers? What do these details tell us about O'Hara—and perhaps life in New York in general? Remind students that Pollock's paintings consisted of seemingly random lines. Together, however, the lines and splashes created a rhythmic unity. Can students find commonalities between the different details in "The Day Lady Died," i.e., the lack of connection between the speaker and who will feed him, the separation between the speaker and poets in Ghana, the interaction with a bank teller who he often makes banking transactions with but doesn't know, etc.?
You may wish to point out to students that poets in the New York School, in general, reacted negatively to Confessional Poetry—consisting of poets such as Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton who wrote highly personal, emotionally-charged poems. Ask students how O'Hara's distaste for Confessional Poetry is evident in "The Day Lady Died".
Franz Kline: Imitating Chance
Show students a reproduction of Abstract Expressionist Franz Kline's Painting No. 7. You may wish to show them a print reproduction or slide, or project the image from the Web site of The Guggenheim Collection.
Tell students that although the lines may seem spontaneous or random, Franz Kline often painted in a way that made his brushstrokes seem spur-of-the-moment; however, his paintings usually resulted from the transfer of a sketch to canvas.
For homework, students should write a poem that makes use of seemingly random details for an intended overall effect. They may use lines from the writing exercise about a tragic event from earlier in the class. Students should imitate O'Hara's style in "The Day Lady Died," i.e., the rambling sentences, specific details, and everyday diction (or word choice).
Refining and Revising
Spend the next class period workshopping and discussing the students' work (see the ARTSEDGE How-To: The Better the Poem, the Better the Performance: Workshop Tips for the Aspiring Slam Poet). Students will then revise their poems based on peer- and self-evaluations.
Assessment:
Use the Assessment Rubric to evaluate students learning.
Extensions:
Prepare students to read their completed poems aloud in a poetry reading. The New York School poets were also very influenced by the French Surrealists. Teach students about the Surrealist movement with the lesson Dalí & Desnos: Surrealism in Poetry and Art. Teach the ARTSEDGE lesson, Rhythm & Improv, Jazz & Poetry, which builds on the concept of free association, makes connections to improvisation in jazz, and provides a more in-depth exploration into sound in poetry.
Sources:
Print:
- O'Hara, Frank. The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara. Edited by Donald Merriam Allen. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.
Web:
Authors:
-
Theresa Sotto
Santa Monica, CA
