Bouquet 1998

This is a *Bouquet* by Tom Wesselmann, and straight away I get a real sense of process from the flat planes of vibrant color. There’s an immediacy to this work, like he’s figured out a way to translate his first impressions of looking at flowers into paint. It’s all about shape and color, the building blocks of seeing and painting. The paint is laid on pretty flat, no messing around, and there’s something so satisfying in the way the colors butt up against each other to define the forms of the flowers. Take the leaves, for instance, they are simplified shapes and a few shades of green do the work of volume and surface. This kind of directness reminds me of Alex Katz. There is an ongoing conversation in art about how we see, and it feels like Wesselmann is asking us to consider how much information we really need to understand an image. It’s not about hiding the process, it’s about embracing it.