Stripes 1957

Gene Davis made *Stripes* with luscious, playful colors that run down the canvas like crayons in the rain. I can almost imagine him wrestling with the painting, coaxing those stripes into existence one by one. What was he thinking as he laid down each stripe, red, yellow, and black? Is there an intentional rhythm or pattern? The paint looks thin, almost watery, which makes the colors feel immediate, like a fleeting thought captured in pigment. I love how the background peeks through, adding depth and mystery to the composition. Those drips! They remind me of Helen Frankenthaler's soak-stain technique, but with a dash of something else. I bet Davis was in conversation with other painters like Kenneth Noland and Morris Louis. It’s like they were all bouncing ideas off each other, figuring out how to make color sing on canvas. Painting is like that, an ongoing experiment, each artist riffing on what came before, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible.