The Deep 2010

Editor: We're looking at "The Deep," an acrylic on canvas painting by Marjan Eggermont from 2010. The two panels of solid blue resonate with each other. There's something stark yet calming about the piece; how do you approach a painting like this? Curator: Its essence resides in the formal interplay between colour and division. Note the rectangular shapes bisected by a subtle line. The chromatic intensity, the pure unmodulated hue of blue, creates a visual experience that eschews narrative or representational content. It is the material properties of the pigment, how it sits on the canvas and engages the viewer’s perception, that matter. Is the division an assertion, or an invitation to a dialogue? Editor: A dialogue? How so? Curator: It hinges on the interplay between presence and absence, between the material actuality of paint and canvas and the intangible realm of perceptual experience. Does the negative space heighten your awareness of the positive form, and vice versa? How would this read were the panels combined, or separated more drastically? The meaning inheres in how it works materially, visually. Editor: So, you're focusing on the relationship between the two blocks of colour. Does the title, "The Deep," offer any further formal clues? Curator: Possibly, as an intentional association designed to influence the viewer’s apprehension of its abstract qualities, its depth, its saturation. Perhaps this refers us back to the visual, in the effect produced by intense hues. Editor: That gives me a new way to think about abstract works. I always looked for meaning outside the canvas. Curator: Precisely! A work like this invites one to examine its construction. In this, its aesthetic purpose resides.