Thundi - Big River 2010

Sally Gabori made this painting, Thundi - Big River, using synthetic polymer paint on canvas. Look at those big, bold curves of color, right? I can just imagine Sally standing there, brush loaded with paint, making these confident marks, one after the other. You can almost feel the rhythm of her hand, the way she must have moved her whole body to get that sweep. It's like she's not just painting a picture, but also mapping a feeling, or maybe even a memory. I wonder what the big river meant to her? Maybe it was a place of gathering, or a boundary, or just something beautiful she saw every day. The black and white feels so solid, like the earth itself, and then those colors – that intense magenta, that sunny yellow – they just pop! The white paint is thin in places, but it is built up in others. It makes me think about Helen Frankenthaler and her soak-stain paintings, but also about the pure joy of making marks, which you see in all kinds of art. We painters, we're always talking to each other, across time and space, riffing on each other's ideas, and borrowing each other's moves. And, hopefully, we are inspiring one another.