Blue Baleen 1987

Dan Christensen made "Blue Baleen" with paint—look at those squeegeed lines of peach and blue over a dark ground. I can imagine the artist dragging color across the canvas, working fast, like Larry Poons or somebody, in a very physical process. There’s a rhythm to those horizontal lines, each one a slightly different width, a slightly different color. I wonder if he was thinking about the way the ocean moves? The thickness and thinness of the paint creates a kind of texture that’s almost sculptural. A big, almost blank rectangle in the middle breaks it all up and draws your eye, doesn't it? It makes me think of a Venetian blind or the lines in Agnes Martin’s work, but Christensen’s painting feels more intuitive, more about the body and the gesture, a kind of conversation between the artist and the canvas. It’s like he’s saying, "Here’s what I feel, here’s what I see, let’s figure it out together."