Untitled 1973

Herman Cherry made this untitled painting in 1973, and it looks like he used gouache. What strikes me most is the layering of the colors; they are not quite flat, not quite opaque. You can see how the blue of the larger square has been dragged across the paper in broad strokes, leaving a residue of the gesture visible. There's a beautiful tension between the looseness of the marks and the geometry of the overall composition. Notice the lower band of color, it is a band of turquoise, but it's framed above and below with yellow and light green. These add a sense of depth and vibration, like a fuzzy halo, or an underpainting that bleeds into the surface. For me, this kind of work relates back to artists like Josef Albers, but with a much more gestural, personal touch. It seems to suggest that art is not about perfection but about the ongoing process of exploration. The conversation between colors, shapes, and marks continues to evolve.