The Swing 2017

Curator: This piece is "The Swing" by Bo Bartlett, created in 2017 using acrylic paint. The solitary figure immediately evokes contemplation. Editor: It certainly does. The chromatic range seems deliberately restrained, lending it a melancholy quality. Note how the subtle shift in value within the sky generates a depth that's almost unsettling. Curator: The figure, a girl on a swing, is positioned with her back to us. It places the viewer outside her subjective experience while, simultaneously, it prompts our empathetic engagement. We're implicated in her apparent quiet solitude as viewers, but this figure existing in isolation speaks to the issues facing young women today; she seems burdened by a quiet despair. The backdrop, with the horizon barely a sliver, furthers this effect, does it not? The sea is rough but constrained by compositional decisions, just like the young woman's freedom. Editor: Interesting take, though I am drawn to the texture Bartlett coaxes from the acrylic. See the way he manipulates the medium to create almost photographic detail on the subject’s jacket, contrasted against broad planes elsewhere? It establishes a captivating interplay between realism and artifice. Even the rope, though realistically depicted, cuts starkly across that cerulean expanse like lines in a geometrical composition. Curator: Yes, that’s undeniable. It’s interesting to view this not as artifice so much as the constructed nature of girlhood itself. The denim jacket feels deliberately chosen as an attempt at agency even while that same agency feels circumscribed. Consider, too, the very deliberate way her bare legs invite the viewers' gaze: an impossible invitation extended only within patriarchal culture. Even her brown hair can be symbolic as representing both the color of the earth as a way of situating young girls to nature, but this falls apart since the swing keeps the woman elevated. It seems this is also the site of tension. Editor: I confess my interest remains anchored in the technical mastery. Bartlett so deftly balances abstraction and representation. Observe how the setting sun kisses the horizon line and warms her skin. And from a structural viewpoint, how those angular ropes cut through and destabilize what would otherwise be a too-comforting and calm tonalist arrangement. Curator: True, and by situating this painting within contemporary and historical analyses, we gain a sharper awareness of current experiences while we, too, question where this moment positions us. Editor: Ultimately, an evocative convergence of material and method to challenge our gaze.