Untitled. Winter Album 2016

This is one of Kinder Album’s Winter Album paintings, made in 2017 with watercolor. The artist has an interest in the process, and you can really see it, like a snapshot of someone working things out. I love the way that Kinder uses watery layers of color to create depth and shadow, especially the background of green and the translucent glass of water, it feels very immediate. It’s a kind of painting that lets you see the structure, the underpainting and construction of the forms. There's something touching about seeing the artist's hand so clearly in the brushstrokes, it makes the work feel really personal and intimate. Look at the strange ham-like object, and the way the red ribbon pulls our eyes across the image. There's a vulnerability that feels reminiscent of some of the early figurative work of Alice Neel, and a similar emphasis on line and form over realism. Like Alice, Kinder invites us to consider painting as a way of seeing and feeling, rather than just a way of representing.