December 1958 1958

Frank Lobdell made this painting in December 1958, it seems to be an act of layering and excavation with a dark palette and luminous forms. Look at those sweeping, gestural marks! I can almost feel the artist’s hand moving across the surface, each stroke building upon the last, searching for resolution. It’s like he's wrestling with the canvas, trying to bring something into being. The paint is thick in places, thin in others, creating a rich, tactile surface that invites you to get closer. I wonder what Lobdell was thinking about when he made this? His forms feel both familiar and strange, like fragments of memory or dream. And that glowing orb at the top—is it a source of light, or something else entirely? Lobdell was part of a whole generation of artists who were pushing the boundaries of what painting could be. They were in dialogue with each other, responding to the moment they lived in, and trying to find new ways of expressing the human condition. Painting is all about that exchange of ideas.