The Fourth 'Book of Schemes'. Album #1, the Third Folder 1978

Valerii Lamakh made "The Fourth 'Book of Schemes'" without a date, from Album #1, the Third Folder. It’s a study in colour, a kind of systematic investigation, but also playful. I’m drawn to the bottom right diagram; a full colour wheel with a muddy brown centre. Each colour radiates outwards, but there’s no real blending, more a sense of discrete juxtaposition. This tension between order and looseness gets to the heart of what it means to make something. Look closely and you’ll see the hand of the artist in the slight irregularities of each section, the almost childlike joy in the application of pure colour. It makes me think of Josef Albers' colour studies, but with a more raw, vulnerable quality. Ultimately, the piece speaks to the beauty found in the process, in the trying, in the imperfect rendering of an idea. Art isn't always about answers; it's about the questions we ask along the way.