Black/White 1956

Guido Molinari made this painting called Black/White with, well, black and white paint. I imagine Molinari standing in front of the canvas, maybe listening to some jazz, really feeling those blocks of color. It looks so simple, right? But the way he's played with those vertical stripes, it's like they're pushing and pulling, vibrating against each other. He lays down the black paint, thick and juicy, and then that stark white, creating a visual rhythm. The cool thing about paintings like these is that they make you question what painting actually is. What is color? What is shape? He would have been in conversation with other artists, like Barnett Newman. Painting is about this ongoing exchange, where we're all riffing off each other. Each painting becomes a place where meaning can happen, and shifts.