Looping 2015

Soey Milk's "Looping," well, there's no date on it, but it feels pretty now, was made with oil paint, probably in a studio, maybe from a photograph. I love the way she works with this muted palette. There's something in the earthy tones, a kind of gentle melancholy, and the way it's applied, so loose and free, that really speaks to the process of making. You can almost feel the artist circling around the image, finding her way. Look at the background, how the trees are barely there, just suggested with these wispy strokes. It’s like memory, not quite solid. Then, that pop of black and orange, disrupting the whole thing. This contrast makes everything feel a bit dreamy. It reminds me a little of some of Marlene Dumas’s works, where the figurative and the abstract kind of bleed into each other, creating this uncertain space. Art’s always talking to art, right? It's a conversation, never a final word.