Ancêtre 59 1974

Dado made this painting, Ancêtre 59, sometime in the 70s, and it looks like he used oil paint. The mark-making feels almost like he's feeling his way around this head, or maybe it's a memory of a head. The colors are mostly in this odd range of lavender and fleshy pink, which gives it this kind of unsettling vibe, like something’s not quite right. You can see the way he's layered the paint, thin in some spots, thicker in others, almost like he's building up a sculpture out of color. Check out that eye – it's like a window into something really messed up, but also super human. The way Dado handles paint reminds me a bit of Francis Bacon, that same kind of distortion and raw emotion. But Dado has his own weirdness going on, a unique way of turning something familiar into a total nightmare. It's that tension, that push and pull, that keeps you looking, trying to make sense of something that refuses to be pinned down.