Il mondo di Platone 1981

Dadamaino made 'Il mondo di Platone' - The World of Plato - with ink on transparent plastic, and right away you sense her interest in the process of repetition and subtle variation. The marks are so consistent, yet they create this shimmering, almost vibrating field. There’s something really compelling about her use of transparent plastic. It’s not paint exactly, but the ink, and how thinly she’s applied it, it almost feels like one. You can imagine Dadamaino working on this piece, each mark a meditation, a step in a process. Look closely, and you notice how each grouping of marks varies almost imperceptibly, this one looks lighter, more translucent, next to one that is darker and more opaque. There’s a real tension here between the grid, with its order, and the organic, almost human quality of the mark making. Thinking about Agnes Martin comes to mind, they both share this interest in seriality, but for Dadamaino, it's like she’s questioning what happens when you introduce the human element to something that is almost mechanical. It's that space in between, I think, where the really interesting things happen.