Severin 1972

Robert Arber made this print, Severin, using a screenprinting technique that layers color and shape to create a playful sense of depth and movement. I imagine Arber carefully preparing each screen, thinking about how the colors—the way the red softly graduates into blue—will interact and how those little organic shapes can either recede or advance. I bet that he was inspired by looking out the window at forms floating in the sky, or maybe even the way a pattern repeats and shifts in wallpaper. I see connections to artists like Ellsworth Kelly and Yayoi Kusama in the way Arber uses color and repetition to create a field of visual sensation. Artists look and borrow, don't they? Painting is always in dialogue with what came before. Here, Arber engages in that conversation, inviting us to join in, to consider how simple shapes and colors can evoke a world of feeling. It reminds us that art, at its heart, is an exploration, a question posed, not an answer given.