Untitled 1989

Here's a Robert Barry, "Untitled," a kind of a cool, serene aquamarine square, evenly applied. When you stand in front of it, you sense the artist pushing paint around on the surface, layering it on until he got exactly the right shade and consistency. I can imagine him working in the studio, mixing the colors, testing it, and maybe stepping back to see how the color hits him. There are tiny words at each edge of the square. ‘Hot So,’ ‘Other,’ ‘Unless.’ It’s not about depth or form, but about the properties of paint itself. Barry was part of a generation looking to push the limits of what art could be. His paintings and installations play with language, perception, and conceptual frameworks. It makes me think of Agnes Martin and her subtle color fields or maybe Sol LeWitt, who used simple rules and systems to generate complex forms. It’s like they’re all in conversation, bouncing ideas off each other. I think art is a conversation—open, ambiguous, and always up for grabs.