Untitled c. 1960

Glen Alps made this untitled print, using a layering of shapes and semi-transparent colors. There's a real sense of process at play here. It's not about hiding the work, it's about showing it. The way Alps uses color and texture, it feels almost like he's building up a world, layer by layer. The paint isn’t too thick, but you can see it, it’s like a veil. The layering of shapes in various transparent colors suggests that a range of tools and techniques may have been used here to build up the final image. Note the floating pink semi-circle towards the top right of the image. Is it rising or falling, I wonder? Alps’s work reminds me a little bit of Arthur Dove, in that both artists share a sense of abstraction rooted in a keen observation of the natural world. Art is always a conversation, right? This piece is not trying to nail down a single meaning. It’s more about opening up possibilities.