8. ‘All these confessions ...’ 1973

Curator: This is Patrick Caulfield’s piece, “8. ‘All these confessions ...’”, currently held in the Tate Collections. Editor: It hits me with a strange, almost dizzying cheerfulness. The color is so vibrant, yet the forms feel unstable. Curator: Note how the rigid grid is subverted, the tiles warping and bending to imply perspective and space. It defies pure geometric abstraction. Editor: The wine glasses, rendered in such stark outline, feel like symbols, perhaps of ritual and the confessions alluded to in the title. Curator: Precisely. The interplay between the flat, graphic elements and the illusionistic space creates a compelling tension. He exploits the properties of each. Editor: Perhaps the artist uses these familiar forms, wine glasses and grids, to channel deeper meanings about memory and how we perceive the world. Curator: Indeed, Caulfield's manipulation of pictorial space reveals the constructed nature of representation itself. Editor: I leave with a newfound appreciation for the complex layers beneath this deceptively simple, colorful scene.