Gedion 2002

Daniel Richter made this painting, Gedion, with layers of energetic marks and a dark, moody palette that feels both restless and melancholy. I can imagine him, brush in hand, building up these figures and spaces through a process of adding, subtracting, and constantly adjusting. Look at the way he’s depicted the figures, how they seem to emerge from and recede back into the ground of the painting. There’s an urgency in the brushstrokes, a feeling of trying to capture something fleeting and unstable. The surface is alive with texture, built up from thin washes and thick impasto. The color palette is striking, the electric blue, the smudgy browns and pinks. It feels like a city at night, full of shadows and hidden corners. Richter reminds us that painting isn’t just about representation, it’s about feeling, and the embodied experience of seeing. He is in conversation with other painters who came before him, reinventing painting for his own time.