Then by Necessity 2013

This piece, "Then by Necessity" by Jacob Kassay, appears to be made from some kind of painted material, perhaps wood or plaster, mounted to the wall. It's really about the form, which has a strange, almost architectural presence. The texture looks smooth, almost like it's been sanded down, which I find intriguing. It's a kind of reductive act, erasing any trace of the hand, but then we're left with this shape, this form, that couldn't have come about without someone making it, which is interesting. The whole piece is a ghostly white, which has this quality of absence. It's less about what's there than what isn't, almost like a memory fading. It reminds me a little of Robert Ryman, in the way that he uses white paint to explore the physicality of the medium itself. There's an elegance to it, an ambiguity that draws you in.