Charles Pollock began his career as a social realist, studying with Thomas Hart Benton at New Yorks Art Students League and revering the works of Mexican Muralists Diego Rivera and Jose Clemente Orozco. In the 1930s he worked with Ben Shawn on the Special Skills Division of the Resettlement Division supervising mural and craft projects in the South and Midwest. From there he moved to Detroit where he became supervisor for the mural painting and graphic arts division of the WPA/FAP. In the 1940s, however, Pollock abandoned his social realist approach to art for abstraction and color field painting, a result either of the times or the influence of his renowned brother Jackson Pollock.

Charles Pollock taught calligraphy, printmaking, typography, and design in the Art Department at Michigan State University from 1942 to 1965. Works by Charles Pollock in the Kresge Art Museum collection include prints from the 1930s as well as the abstract painting #95 from 1967.

Biography courtesy of Roughton Galleries, www.antiquesandfineart.com/roughton