Process Development 1972

Robert Goodnough made this painting, Process Development, with oil on canvas. Can you feel him, brush in hand, making hundreds of marks one by one? There’s a real sense of emergence in this piece. I wonder if Goodnough ever felt like these little marks were like birds taking flight, especially the way the blues and reds cluster at the top. Each stroke is so clear and distinct, a testament to the physicality of painting. You can almost feel the drag of the brush, the viscosity of the paint. It makes me think about the ways in which we, as painters, are all in dialogue, trying to find new ways to see and feel and be. We are, after all, just a bunch of marks on a surface, but those marks have the potential to speak volumes. It's a constant back-and-forth, an exchange of ideas across time that keeps us going.