Untitled 67 1973

This untitled painting was made by Alexander Calder, and you can almost see it come into being: the simple shapes, the flat colors, and the dark lines. Calder painted with a directness that I really admire. I can imagine him quickly blocking in that vibrant red circle, right in the middle, bam! Then, those amoeba-like black forms radiating outward. They’re so bold and confident, each one a little different, like he’s riffing on a theme. The paint looks quite thin, which gives the painting a lightness, like it could almost float away. There's something playful about the way he scrawls the text around the edges, too. I wonder what he was thinking as he made it? Maybe he was thinking of Miro's biomorphic shapes and line work and how they float on the picture plane, somehow creating an atmosphere. Ultimately, it’s like a visual poem that encourages the eye to meander and discover something new each time. Paintings like this make me excited to get back into the studio, sparking endless conversations between artists across time and space.