Untitled 

Curator: Stepping up close to this “Untitled” painting by Paul Ranson, I am instantly transported, wouldn’t you agree? Editor: Immediately. It's a dreamlike, slightly off-kilter landscape. There’s an immediate sense of naive rendering combined with bold brushstrokes, it creates an unexpectedly visceral reaction. It almost feels unfinished. Curator: Unfinished perhaps only in the best of ways! Ranson leaves space for our imagination to breathe into the scene. Look at how he lays down acrylic on canvas, these thick dabs. It suggests figures and foliage but leaves so much undefined. The materiality lends it to an impressionist feel—the canvas seems to soak up light and glow. Editor: Yes, focusing on the method of making, there’s also a definite lack of blending, with block colors side by side in an almost jarring manner. The production of a picture like this, especially one that mimics leisure, ignores so much of the laborious effort in producing it and making art historical references palatable. Are we even certain of when it was made? Curator: We lack an exact date of origin but sense it resonates deeply with other Post-Impressionist and Nabis works from the late 19th century. Think of this painting as Ranson creating his own little Arcadia – nymphs, dappled sunlight…the man in the background might suggest a hunter! He pulls us back to the realm of primal human dynamics. It’s also intriguing to view through the lens of the period's prevalent Orientalism; maybe Ranson tried to portray a more exotic setting for our nudes. Editor: The exoticism of leisure. And the ready availability and cheap cost of new paint products surely gave artists in the Nabis circle the capacity to produce such seemingly quickly made artworks like this—though in reality that effort and artistic consideration are obscured to modern consumers by a fiction of immediate pleasure. Curator: A fiction we gladly indulge, isn’t it? Editor: Perhaps. But the consideration of production challenges the art for art's sake paradigm and asks us who profits from the creation, dissemination, and yes, even consumption of these Arcadian fantasies. It certainly provides a lot to consider when examining Ranson's choice to title it “Untitled”. Curator: That he did. Now there's an invitation to our souls!