Ecology II 1988

Alexander Bogen made Ecology II with paint, but what kind? He's got these blues, like he was trying to capture the feeling of being underwater. The paint's not too thick, more like a watercolor dream. I wonder if he thinned it out himself, or if he let the colors do their own thing. The texture is smooth, almost slippery, like you could dive right in. Then there's that black shape near the top, feels heavy, like it wants to sink. Notice the little dots of red, like a secret code. They lead your eye around the painting, making you search. It’s a bit like some of those paintings Joan Mitchell did, where she was using the paint kind of intuitively, like she wasn't trying to capture reality, but some kind of feeling in the world. Ultimately, it's up to you what you see in it. Art's just a conversation anyway, right?