When
created his quintessential
white painting in 1918,
White
on White, he distilled painting to its key elements, encouraging
consideration of material, surface and texture. Inspired by this pursuit of
purity,
created a series of
White Paintings
in 1951, monochromatic canvases that were meant to appear untouched by human
hands. It was also in the 1950’s that
began his primarily white paintings on square surfaces. In the 1960’s
created his predominantly white “Unfurleds” series, featuring streams of
color over blank canvases.
engaged in a similar tendency throughout his career, constantly considering the
white of the canvas. In “
ONE
THIRD WHITE,” a group show on view now at
Artspace Warehouse,
this dialogue with white continues, exploring the works of several artists and
the multidimensional, and emotional potential of white.
Similar to Malevich,
builds discernible layers on top of a white canvas, albeit through a
mixed-media technique. Beginning with charcoal and graphite drawings, Hansen
applies oil paint on top of her figures, intentionally leaving their forms
incomplete, symbolically conveying “the complexities of people and how we are
each not yet completed.” A similar mixed-media layered practice is found in the
works of
, who creates multifaceted composites of painting and
strips of paper. Often overpainting to develop harmony between color, form and
texture, Holzke leaves the traces of her process visible, leaving her works
accessible.
Other artists on view work in a
vein closer to Louis and Francis, employing the luminous potential of white
within a composition. In his works resembling window panes, often with glowing
white segments,
layers sheets of newsprint over wood, maps out his
geometric shapes in red pencil, and then uses acrylic and resin to add color
and a shiny surface.
leaves the vast white of the paper in her ink and graphite dot works—careful
yet dizzying swarms of pencil markings and a seemingly infinite number of black
and grey dots. Each piece—titled after the number of dots it contains—is
created with stamps, and through repetition and variations in pressure, Kolo
adds dynamism to blank white surfaces.
also uses repetitive markings, yet in a divergent process where he covers his
canvases in acrylics, with signs of white seeing through. Inspired by human
interventions in nature, Becker’s works resemble organic materials that have
been repeatedly altered and scraped, closely attuned to surface and texture
“ONE THIRD WHITE” is on view
at Artspace Warehouse, Los Angeles, Mar. 15th–Apr. 25th, 2014.