Conversation 1946

Jean-Paul Riopelle made this watercolour painting, called Conversation, with dark, gestural marks set against a luminous yellow ground. I can imagine Riopelle, brush in hand, building up layers of these spontaneous marks, allowing the painting to emerge through a process of action and reaction. Looking at it, I empathize with the artist and the physicality of his process. You can see in the dark, tangled strokes a kind of urgency, a desire to capture something fleeting or subconscious. Maybe he was thinking about the push and pull of relationships when he made it? The dark strokes really stand out against the fluidity of the wash. There's a tension here between control and chance, intention and accident, that reminds me of other abstract painters I admire, who also embraced ambiguity as a source of creative potential. It's like they are all in conversation with one another across time, inspiring each other's creativity. Painting is an ongoing dialogue that embraces ambiguity and uncertainty, allowing for multiple readings.