Daylight 1975

Editor: This is Bill Jacklin's "Daylight" from the Tate collection. I'm struck by its almost textile-like quality and how the density shifts from light to dark. What readings do you find in this piece? Curator: The shift in tone evokes a fading, doesn’t it? Daylight, as a symbol, has long carried associations with clarity, revelation, and even hope. But here, its gradual descent into darkness suggests a more complex narrative, maybe about the ephemeral nature of such virtues. Editor: So, you see the gradient itself as symbolic? Curator: Precisely. Consider how light and dark are almost universal symbols for good and evil, knowledge and ignorance, life and death. Jacklin seems to be playing with that very loaded iconography, complicating it. What do you think this complexity adds to the work? Editor: It makes it feel less straightforward, more like a meditation on change. I like that. Curator: Agreed. The symbols resonate with a larger cultural understanding of time, memory, and the beauty in transition.