Jackson Pollock's "Random" Paint Blotches Are Genius-Level Physics
In 2006, Jackson Pollock's painting No. 5, 1948 was sold to an anonymous buyer for around $140 million.
Jackson Pollock
It is now a stain-resistant rug in his anonymous bar.
Pollock is the poster boy for art that looks like a bunch of paint blotches. The reason being that his paintings are a bunch of goddamn paint blotches.But Actually ...
Fun fact: There's software which can tell a real Pollock painting from an elaborate forgery. How the hell is that possible? Because Pollock's work contains fractals: infinitely complex, never-ending mathematical patterns that are specific to his work. While everyone thought he was merely dripping paint everywhere randomly like a drunken contractor you hired on Craigslist, he was in fact creating entire worlds.
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This is explained in the above diagram, which we totally understand.
So how do we know the fractals aren't there by accident? Well, the
later the Pollock painting, the richer and more complex the patterns,
and thus the greater its fractal dimension. And there are even more mysteries hiding in his work. It appears that Pollock took advantage of an area of fluid dynamics scientists have only recently thought to study. This phenomenon is called "coiling,"
and you've experienced it while dripping honey, except no one gave you
millions of dollars afterward. It's when thick fluid falls onto itself
in the form of coils, similarly to rope, and creates patterns that can
be described by a mathematical equation.