What to Remember 2018

Vincent Xeus made “What to Remember” with a monochromatic palette, all blues, from indigo to cerulean, and one bright white slash. It’s kind of like the blues are washing over everything, memory as a feeling. The surface has a scrubby kind of texture. It feels like he's trying to both reveal and conceal at the same time. Is he trying to make something solid? Or is it supposed to dissolve? Look at the way the hat is built up with these almost dry brush strokes, but then the background just kind of melts away, so evocative of something that is hard to hold. And then you see that bold white mark, almost like a bolt of lightning, cutting across the composition. Does it disrupt? Or does it hold everything together? I can’t decide. I am reminded of Elizabeth Peyton and her interest in capturing a moment or feeling, and the sense that art isn’t about answers, but rather how you can construct ways of seeing, thinking, and feeling.