Abstract Painting

The Ability of Paint

Interview with painter Paul Behnke, curator of the exhibition Eight Painters at Kathryn Markel Fine Arts, New York.

Michael Rutherford interviews artist Joseph Montgomery about his work. Montgomery comments: "I have since developed a studio practice that facilitates the building of objects that look and act as paintings while I publicly call myself a painter. I assemble the image of a painting from a variety of materials that achieve the component elements of […]

Joan Thorne’s Musical Paintings

Supreme Fiction

James Panero reviews an exhibition of recent paintings by Joan Thorne at Sideshow Gallery, on view through November 10, 2013. Panero writes: “One of abstract painting’s earliest interests was the depiction of sound… Joan Thorne explores this legacy with a finely tuned suite of work.Like the recent sculptures of Frank Stella, which visualized Scarlatti, Thorne’s abstractions have […]

Anna Kunz: Interview

Painter's Bread

Michael Rutherford interviews painter Anna Kunz about her work. Asked about the "supplemental appendages" that extend from her paintings, Kunz remarks: "They gesture out to the viewer. The space around the painting is included, and the painting breaks a little free of its format. The shadows that are created by the work are implicated. I […]

Frank Bowling: Map Paintings

Abstract Critical

John Bunker interviews painter Frank Bowling on the occasion of the exhibition Frank Bowling: The Map Paintings 1967-1971 at Hales Gallery, London, on view through November 23, 2013. Bowing discusses his early figurative work and his transition to abstract painting. Asked about the orgin of the Map Paintings, he comments: "I was just laying the […]

The Edge and a Little Beyond

Six abstract artists push out the edge of the painting. The work, verging on sculpture, clearly comes from a painter’s mind.

DeShawn Dumas: Interview

DeShawn Dumas prefers materials that possess troubled pasts in addition to their aesthetic qualities.

Steven Cox: Interview

Painter's Bread

Michael Rutherford interviews painter Steven Cox about his work and process. Cox remarks: "At base, I am influenced by the notion of temporality, where the inevitability of change unpredictably alters the appearance and formation of an item. I tend to apply this understanding of temporality to how I approach the making of my work whilst […]

Sanford Wurmfeld: Chorus of Color

(READ)art

Heather Zises reviews two recent exhibitions Sanford Wurmfeld: Color Visions 1966 – 2013 at the Hunter College/Times Square Gallery and Sanford Wurmfeld: Light & Dark at Minus Space. Zises writes that “The key to appreciating these works has much to do with the figure-ground relationship of form and color. For each painting, Wurmfeld maps out […]

Nicolas de Staël: Needs to be Seen

The general neglect of de Staël is a missed opportunity for American painters.

Carrie Moyer: Studio Visit

Carrie Moyer describes her process, which begins with small black and white collages, and discusses her influences – including Miro’s The Farm (1921–1922) and paintings by Christian Schad and Alexej von Jawlensky.

Trudy Benson: Studio Visit

#FFFFFF Walls

Jonathan Chapline and Lorraine Nam visit Trudy Benson's studio on the occasion of her solo exhibition Paint at Horton Gallery, New York, on view from April 25 – June 2 , 2013. Benson discusses her process: "For the most part for these paintings, I feel like they are a collage of different painting moves and I […]

Robert Janitz: Interview

Painter's Bread

Michael Rutherford interviews painter Robert Janitz about his work. Rutherford's introduction begins: "Paint on canvas and their combined affect on a viewer are what painting is all about. I can’t help but admire an artist who uses those materials in a bold matter-of-fact way, and the paintings of Robert Janitz are exactly what I mean. […]

Halsey Hathaway: Interview

An interview accompanying an exhibition of new paintings by Halsey Hathaway at Rawson Projects, Brooklyn, New York.

On Frank Bowling

Abstract Critical

Courtney J. Martin writes about the paintings of Frank Bowling on the occasion of the exhibition Frank Bowling: Paintings 1967 – 2012 at Spanierman Modern, New York, through April 20, 2013. Martin writes that Bowling’s “poured paintings were often a combination of action painting and compositional devices, like vertical lines, that were used by the […]

Al Held’s Visual Thresholds

The graphic monumentality of Al Held’s Alphabet Paintings comes from vigorously painted architectonic arrangements of letterforms painted on near-mural scale canvases.

Alan Uglow: Object & Image

Alan Uglow’s abstract paintings engage with each other and the viewer to create subtle, shifting apprehensions of flatness and illusion.

Hilma Af Klint: Paintings for the Future

A new exhibition sheds new light on a pioneering abstract painter and one of the most enigmatic artists of the 20th century.

Jonathan Allmaier: Painting-Culture

Painter's Bread

Michael Rutherford talks to painter Jonathan Allmaier about his work. Allmaier comments: "I think the key to letting the paintings make themselves is to regard the materials, along with their contingent circumstances (and it’s silly to think of circumstances as separable from an object anyway) as mental states, without distinction from a particular physical state. […]

Collin Hatton: Studio Visit

#FFFFFF Walls

Studio visit and interview with painter Collin Hatton. Hatton comments on his interest in the "interaction between the materiality and the image interacting and fusing together in some way. I think a big part of these paintings is treating them, treating the paintings as images as well as objects and how those objects react in […]