No. 3 Study for Skins + Shirts c. 1994

Ernie Barnes created this loose, figurative painting called “No. 3 Study for Skins + Shirts” with an earthy palette, punctuated by the clear blues of denim. The artist looks like they’re having a good time, laying down these fluid washes, letting the characters emerge. I’m thinking about Barnes, building the painting, feeling the push and pull, the negotiation between observation, memory, and invention. The textures in this piece suggest a kind of raw, immediate energy, a really physical and emotionally present kind of mark-making. Look at the way the limbs are elongated, not quite realistic, but vividly expressive of effort and movement. It feels like they are growing, or stretching, or springing. The players are frozen in mid-air, and yet somehow still alive. Barnes was, himself, a sportsman. I wonder if painting this scene was a way for him to reflect on physicality? It reminds me of other painters, like Alice Neel or Bob Thompson, who capture something beyond the surface of their subjects. Artists are always talking to one another across time, constantly inspiring new ways of seeing, thinking, and feeling through painting.