[title not known] 1970

Editor: This untitled piece is by Dieter Roth, and is part of the Tate collection. The flatness and bold colors create a fascinating tension. What strikes you most about the composition? Curator: The interplay of figure and ground is compelling. Note how Roth employs color not to represent reality, but to construct a visual system where forms are defined by their chromatic relationships. What does that evoke for you? Editor: I suppose it highlights the artificiality of the image, its construction. Curator: Precisely. Roth subverts our expectations of pictorial space, inviting us to consider the artwork as a self-contained system of signs, rather than a window onto the world. Editor: That's a different way to look at it than I usually would! Curator: Indeed, and hopefully a useful perspective on Roth's unique approach.