Total Pollocks tee tutorial

Jackson Pollock - Autumn Rhythmn, 1950

I've always loved the work of Jackson Pollock, so when I saw these rather fab t-shirts in Uniqlo who are doing a Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) NYC collaboration I was inspired.

The Pollock t-shirt design I liked the best was in the men's collection and having tried the smallest size (way too big) figured I would have to make my own version instead.

It's much more fun this way!

Uniqlo MOMA Jackson Pollock Men's t-shirt £12.50

What do you need?

• Cotton / cotton blend t-shirt
• Fabric paint
• Newspaper
• large plastic bag / sheeting
• Paintbrushes / toothbrush
• Iron

I used a range of brushes to create the effects you see on my finished t-shirt. The smaller brushes create a more even splatter; whereas the large brushes can carry a decent amount of paint and you can get the more heavy splash effects with them.

Depending on the consistency of the fabric paint you use, I found the best effect was achieved by making a quite fluid paint by adding water to achieve a 50/50 solution. I used berol fabric paint. 

To vary the types of paint texture I used a small paint brush for the medium splatts, a toothbrush brushed against a scrap of plastic / card to create the very tiny spray and the large paintbrush for the heavy splats. I also used the small paint brush to free-style the larger blocks of paint - which had the added benefit of using up some of the large blobs of fabric paint.

I left the t-shirt out in the sun to dry and then ironed it as per the fabric paint instructions to fix the dye into the t-shirt. So, there you have it - the Pollock tee.

Give it a go - it is liberating!