Pliage (Folded Painting) 1971

André-Pierre Arnal made this folded painting, which is a collision between color, surface, and process. The distinction between the red and the off-white is so striking, almost like a challenge. I'm really drawn to the texture here. It looks like Arnal hasn’t tried to hide the folds or the marks, but let them be part of the artwork. It’s almost like the painting is breathing. Look how the light catches on the surface, creating shadows and highlights that dance across the composition. It feels very immediate, like I could just reach out and touch it, trace the lines with my fingers. There’s a Japanese artist, Kazuo Shiraga, who would literally paint with his feet, smearing the pigment across the canvas. I wonder if Arnal was thinking about that kind of embodied process when he made this. Ultimately, this painting is open to endless interpretations and is less about answers, and more about questions.