To say this show took my breath away is no understatement. After a long journey, knowing the Bernard Frize talk was cancelled, we arrived and had a coffee to give us some strength. But we didn’t need it. As we walked into the first room, I was hit with ryman’s….. And ….. Two amazing paintings where paint was the hero. Without exception, this show had work that celebrated and honoured the very medium of paint, it’s liquidity, it’s ability to delineate movement, it’s ability to be celebrated for what it is.
To choose a favourite in each area (a silly game I play, making myself explain why…) was SO difficult. The potential and variety of the work and the possibilities each one suggested was awe inspiring. Thankfully I was going around the show with Georgina, which made us both stop and question where the source of interest lie in that which arrested us. Made made some pretty impressive guesses around the creation and nature of some of the works, clarified by Daniel Sturgis later.
The curation of the show was interesting too- from each section, you received glimpses of paintings you had not yet seen, and ones you had been past. The potential conversations between the works were so interesting.
The questions after with Daniel Sturgis proved informative, hearing his reasons for choosing the works, and more details about the ones that puzzled me. My favourite of his answers was in response to a question about the monochrome work. …. He simply said “People say abstract artists have no skill. I disagree. And this is evidence enough.”
The crossing between disciplines of abstract painting was the key idea behind the show, how painting ‘borrows’ from design, popular culture, architecture and the like. For me that had limited interest. The action of paint on surface, the artists presence and action was soul food. To see such variety of approaches and results where the paint was celebrated, both through modernism and in contemporary work was inspiration, to say the least.
Back at the painting seminar, interestingly someone else who had been at the show said “this wasn’t the kind of work you could look at for long. A bit of a one hit wonder”. As I considered her remark with bewilderment, I again realised just how significant this show has been for my work. Materiality all the way!!
findingawaythrough 