Fold 2004

Bridget Riley made this color study, Fold, with paint, and it's all about how shapes and colors play together. Looking at the colors, they're super flat, but not in a boring way. They're laid down like smooth, bold statements. What’s interesting to me is how each form seems carefully planned, yet the overall effect feels so dynamic. It's like she's folding color, light and movement together, creating this optical dance. Take a look at the way these yellow shapes meet with the blue. It's a simple move, but it creates the whole painting. The colors don't blend, they just are, next to each other, doing their thing. Riley's work reminds me a bit of Josef Albers, who was also obsessed with how colors change depending on what they're next to. But Riley takes it somewhere else, into this realm of pure visual sensation. It's a conversation about seeing, and how what we see is always changing.