Light in Itself 1979

Sam Francis made *Light in Itself*, a work that seems to explode with energy, like a painterly big bang! The eye is immediately drawn to that big yellow square, bisected by a vertical stripe of intense blue. This isn't just flat color; you can almost feel the texture, the built-up layers that give the colors such depth. The paint is both thin and thick, transparent and opaque. Splatters and drips of red, blue, pink, and yellow dance around the central forms, creating a sense of movement, as if the painting is still in the process of becoming. There's a fantastic tension between control and chance, order and chaos. That one thin line of black paint to the left of the big yellow square, it's as if he flicked the paint off the brush with his wrist, these little details make the painting, for me. Francis's approach reminds me a bit of Joan Mitchell, both artists were interested in how to express feeling through abstract forms. It's not about representation, but about the pure experience of color and the act of painting itself.