Contraband 1969

This is Lynda Benglis’s "Contraband", and it’s like she just let the paint rip right out of the can and onto the floor. Look at those gloopy primary colors, all swirled together in one glorious, messy puddle! I love to imagine what it might have been like to be Lynda in that moment – just totally giving in to the material and letting it do its thing. Benglis's work always gets me thinking about how the surface of a painting can become this site of inquiry, this place where we work things out in real-time. You can see this in other works by Benglis. It’s as if the artist is having a conversation with the paint itself, pushing and pulling, coaxing and coercing, until something emerges that feels both intentional and totally unexpected. Artists have been riffing off each other for centuries, and Benglis’s joyful messiness reminds me of some of those action painters. It’s like she’s saying, "Yeah, I see you, Pollock. And I’m gonna raise you one!" It’s all about process and experimentation and embracing the beauty of imperfection.