The Dallas Museum of Art has just acquired a rare sculpture from the abstract-expressionist painter Jackson Pollock. The museum was among the first American museums to ever obtain an artwork by Pollock, and now stands as one of only two museums to possess a Pollock sculpture.

According to the New York Times, this artwork is one of only six remaining sculptures by the famous painter. Furthermore, ArtNews accounts that this is one of two untitled sculptures created just before Pollock’s death, while he was staying at the house of Tony Smith in 1956.

The museum notes that while Pollock created at least a dozen sculptures in his lifetime, most were lost, at times destroyed by the artist himself.

Jackson Pollock, Number 3 (1952).
Photo: courtesy the Dallas Museum of Art.

Gavin Delahunty, the museum’s senior curator of contemporary art, told the Times that when collectors Gayle and Paul Stoffel, who helped the museum purchase the sculpture from the Tony Smith estate, heard that “this is a once in a lifetime opportunity,” they immediately were on board.

The sculpture is currently on view at the Dallas Museum of Art’s exhibition of Pollock’s works, which opened in November 2015 and is on view until March 20th. The exhibition is the first curated by Delahunty since he started at the museum in May of 2014.

Entitled “Blind Spots,” the show exhibits more than 70 works of various mediums. It is notably the largest assembly of Pollock’s black paintings, the series of black enamel paintings made between 1951 and 1953. The last survey of these lesser-known works was at the MoMA is 1967, and was a little over half the size, as the DMA exhibition has 31 of these works on view.

Delahunty discusses the significance of these unusual works in a release, stating the black paintings “were exceptional in their absolute merging of color and surface, which went over and above what Pollock himself had previously achieved”.

Jackson Pollock, untitled (circa 1949–50).
Photo: courtesy the Dallas Museum of Art.

As the DMA details in a release, “Blind Spots” is only the third exhibition to exclusively show work by Pollock, and many of the works have not been on view for many years. Including the new addition to the collection, the show exhibits five of the six remaining Pollock sculptures in the world.