Orange-Pink-Green 1971

John Hoyland made this print, *Orange-Pink-Green*, with a riot of marks, splatters, and stains. I can almost see him in the print studio, moving intuitively, maybe even dancing around the paper, reacting to the evolving image as it emerges. I wonder if Hoyland was thinking about color field painting or maybe even the more raw, process-oriented work of someone like Helen Frankenthaler. There’s this big, juicy pink rectangle, but it’s not hard-edged; it’s got these fuzzy, almost ethereal boundaries. Then you've got these lyrical splashes of green and lavender that seem to float around the central form. It’s like the colors are in conversation with each other, pushing and pulling, creating a sense of depth and movement. Each gesture is like a note in a visual melody. It reminds us that artists don’t exist in a vacuum. We are all in conversation, constantly borrowing, riffing, and expanding on the ideas of those who came before us.