Letter with Red 2009

This is Brice Marden’s *Letter with Red* and it's all about the hand moving, trying, and then trying again. I can imagine Marden, with his brush loaded, looping and layering lines of black paint, then adding a few jolts of red for emphasis. He must have been in the zone, you know, that place where painting feels like you’re just channeling something from somewhere else? The beige ground peeks through, giving the lines space to breathe. I love the way the black lines thicken and thin, some almost disappearing, while the red jumps out like a shout. There’s a push and pull that reminds me of Cy Twombly, but with Marden’s own restrained sensibility. You can feel the physicality, the way he was working out something through gesture, a dance of intention and accident. That's what painting is, I think, an open-ended conversation, a space to explore, question, and connect with other artists across time.