Embroidered Halo 1958

Adja Yunkers made "Embroidered Halo" with juicy brushstrokes, dancing between violet, crimson, and indigo. It probably came into being through a long process of intuitive shifts. I imagine him, with his Latvian roots, trying to wrestle something into being. What do you do with that big black mass at the bottom? It's like he's trying to lift it up, to make it float, with that halo. I sympathize with him, with that urge to bring something up from the depths. I'm looking at how the colors interact, the crimson peeking out from beneath the black. And that sweeping gesture of violet, trying to suggest something heavenly, something beyond. It reminds me of other painters, like Rothko, trying to reach for something ineffable. But Yunkers is doing it with a kind of raw energy, a kind of awkward grace. That's what I love about painting, how we're all in this ongoing conversation, trying to figure out how to make sense of the world, one brushstroke at a time.