Beach Shadows 1947

William Baziotes, who lived from 1912 to 1963, made this beach scene with big, juicy, gestural marks in a palette of teal, brown, red, and yellow. I just love imagining him in the act of painting, pushing the artwork into being, shifting and emerging through trial, error, and intuition. I sympathize with Baziotes and can imagine him thinking hard when he made this, experimenting with the push-and-pull of colors, texture, and surface. The paint seems applied thinly, almost staining the canvas in areas, while elsewhere, there's a visible build-up, a record of his touch. I see the brown contour around the central form and it seems so deliberate. What does it communicate? Feeling? Intention? Meaning? His art is definitely in conversation with other painters. It is as if painters are in an ongoing conversation through the ages. Isn’t that inspiring? The artist’s embodied expression embraces ambiguity and uncertainty, allowing for multiple interpretations.