Untitled c. 1969

This untitled work by George Bunker is a flurry of colored marks on paper, a kind of chromatic weather system. You can almost feel his hand moving across the page, layering color like a kid with a new box of crayons. I imagine Bunker, maybe a bit restless, sitting in a cluttered studio, surrounded by half-finished canvases. There’s a tension in the charcoal outline, like he’s trying to contain the chaos within. Look how the greens and blues crash into the earth tones. Is it a landscape? An interior? Who knows! The texture isn’t so much about thick and thin but more about the speed and pressure of mark making. It’s like he’s carving out space with each stroke, pushing and pulling the image into existence. It reminds me of Cy Twombly, but more contained, like a secret language whispered on a torn-out notebook page. Painting is just a way of thinking with your hands. Artists are always talking to each other, even across time.