In life, Jackson Pollock never made it to Paris. Hard at work pushing American art beyond anything war-shattered Europe could muster, he died with an unused passport and an inferiority complex.

In death, Pollock was confirmed as a breakthrough star, with a status akin to his great idol, Pablo Picasso. So it is apt that a major retrospective of the work of Pollock’s early years should draw crowds to the Musée Picasso in Paris, tucked in a backstreet of the city’s Marais district.