Live The Life: Jackson Pollock

When the father of abstract expressionism arrived in New York in the 1930s, the man Time would dub 'Jack the Dripper' was a uniquely American force of virility and 'bermasculinity, exploding the scale and sexuality of Europeans like Pablo Picasso into brutal, ejaculatory bits. Art critics like Clement Greenberg and heiress and gallerist Peggy Guggenheim (who would mount both Pollock and, in 1943, the painter's first solo show) couldn't help but swoon. Sure, the unprecedented physicality of his work paired with his self-destructive swagger bolstered his bad-boy appeal, but it was his always-tight T-shirts, low-slung Levi's, and hunky handyman flannels'all true to his Wyoming roots -- that sealed the deal.

Photography by Jonathan Kambouris