Untitled 1961

Curator: We're standing before an "Untitled" portrait created by Gaston Chaissac in 1961, made with acrylic paint. Editor: The colors immediately jump out – these bold blocks of reds, yellows, blues, so playful and deceptively simple. It's a child's drawing made sophisticated. Curator: I agree, there is almost something primal to its execution, a rejection of academic constraint, fitting when we examine the context, because Chaissac, although self-taught, sought a kind of rawness, or what many at the time termed "outsider art". We could look at this handling of acrylic, applied almost flatly in discrete regions, less as "Fauvist" and more from a construction process where a maker takes base elements to compose a complete form. Editor: I am so struck by the upturned face that floats as though separate, or in contrast, to the body. Like an angelic cherub peeking down or observing, maybe from a dream-space? It’s interesting you point that out; in viewing it, I’m really looking at something less constructed and more... intuitively assembled, a symbolic language made real through very elemental execution of materials. Curator: The medium of acrylic plays an essential role, it is an industrial product allowing faster build-up and ease. I see how he employs this practicality; it enables him to quickly lay down these regions, creating a visual shorthand – and as such it is still so effective 60 years later, where you notice how little effort seems to be necessary in making a memorable form! Editor: Ultimately it feels optimistic, buoyant somehow. This work serves almost as a little beacon; Chaissac certainly captured a vibrant sense of being alive, or perhaps that constant wish we each have for light. Curator: A pertinent note to close on, the lightness and optimism belie a complex arrangement that transcends pure application and points towards the complex layers any viewer brings in perception.