No title 1988

This untitled artwork was made by Al Taylor, sometime in 1988. It's made with watercolor, graphite, and colored pencil on paper. Look at the stacked marks on the page, vertical, horizontal, floating and casting shadows. I imagine Al Taylor in his studio, playing with color and form, a dance between intention and accident. The watercolor is applied in thin washes, letting the paper breathe. Look at the vertical lines. I see a quiet but insistent energy in the composition, a careful balance between the deliberate and the accidental. What was he thinking as he made those marks? Taylor reminds me of other artists who explore the poetics of everyday life, finding beauty in the mundane, like, say, Vija Celmins. Artists are always in conversation, riffing off each other’s ideas, inspiring new ways of seeing. Ultimately, painting is all about embracing ambiguity. There is not one interpretation, but a multitude.