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Arts & Communication

ARTICLE
Computer vision profiling and identification of

authentic Jackson Pollock drip paintings

Lior Shamir*
Department of Computer Science, Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas, United States of
America

Abstract
The drip paintings of Jackson Pollock introduced a unique style of abstract expressionism
that has attracted substantial interest. Here, a quantitative approach to the analysis
of Jackson Pollock’s drip paintings was applied. The analysis was performed using
quantitative elements from authentic Jackson Pollock paintings, and comparing them
to the same quantitative elements computed from fake Jackson Pollock paintings.
Profiling the differences can lead to the identification of unique mathematical elements
that characterize Jackson Pollocks artistic style. These elements provide a new way
of examining and analyzing the visual content of art. That quantitative analysis can
expand on the qualitative analysis methods and provide new insights about visual
art. The results show that authentic Jackson Pollock paintings can be differentiated
from faked Jackson Pollock paintings in ∼96% of the cases. While fractals provide the
strongest differences between authentic and faked Pollock paintings, the analysis also
reveals other elements of the paintings that are unique to Jackson Pollock’s style. These
*Corresponding author: elements include textures, entropy, and the distribution of light.
Lior Shamir
(lshamir@mtu.edu)
Keywords: Pollock; Drip paintings; Image analysis; Quantitative analysis; Art
Citation: Shamir L. Computer
vision profiling and identification authentication
of authentic Jackson Pollock drip
paintings. Arts & Communication.
2024;2(2):1628.
doi: 10.36922/ac.1628 1. Introduction
Received: August 18, 2023
The application of computer vision to art analysis provides a new approach to the
Accepted: November 23, 2023 studying of art history, allowing to profile and identify insights about art that are difficult
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Published Online: February 15, to sense and quantify with the unaided human eye. While computer vision has not yet
2024 elevated to the level of human vision, computers have several advantages over manual
Copyright: © 2024 Author(s). analysis and can provide measurements that complement the human perception of art.
This is an Open-Access article For instance, computer analysis can provide accurate measurements of the mathematical
distributed under the terms of the elements used in the painting. Such artistic aspects can be determined in a quantitative
Creative Commons Attribution-
Noncommercial License, permitting manner, and expand art analysis to quantitative methods that enhance the traditional
all non-commercial use, distribution, qualitative analysis. That provides a new paradigm of art analysis, driven by mathematical
and reproduction in any medium,
provided the original work is and quantitative aspects of the paintings, and can be used to reveal new information
properly cited. that is difficult to sense with the unaided human eye alone. A common example of a
mathematical measurement in art is fractal analysis, which had been shown to be linked
5
Publisher’s Note: AccScience
Publishing remains neutral with to the artistic perception of paintings. 6
regard to jurisdictional claims in
published maps and institutional Jackson Pollock, one of the most influential and pioneering abstract expressionist
affiliations. artists, introduced a unique artistic style based on dripping paint on a canvas. In
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Volume 2 Issue 2 (2024) 1 doi: 10.36922/ac.1628