Inscribed 1944

Here's a geometric abstraction made by Josef Albers, called 'Inscribed', with its layers of gray and white. It’s hard to know how Albers made this, but I can imagine him working carefully, patiently, going over and over it. These rectangles feel like they are trapping space somehow, or creating a kind of maze. I start to wonder what it was like for Albers as he built these forms so meticulously. It makes me want to be just as rigorous in my studio. Albers was so interested in the way we see and experience color, especially how colors change depending on their context and relationship to each other. This exploration of visual perception connects him to other artists who were experimenting with abstraction at the time. The artist’s work becomes a place where ideas are passed around between artists, like an ongoing conversation. As artists, we make art from other art, we breathe new life into it and each other.