Look, See

Untitled (1971 Road Runner)

 

 

 

Untitled (1971 Road Runner), 2005, HTML & JPEG, 420 x 640 pixels (image used without permission)

 

 

 

 

Richard Schur's "Untitled" 2005

 

 

Richard Schur, Untitled, 2005, acrylic on canvas, 30 x 25 cm

The fine-weave canvas of Richard Schur's Untitled, 2005 is stretched over a thin wood stretcher, the front edges of which are rounded, so the painting doesn't have a a surface that is simply a taut, flat, pictorial plane. Instead the eyes follow the fabric surface around to the edge, and because of this the viewer becomes aware that the painting has a thickness that makes it more than just a picture. This awareness is further enhanced by the how the panes of color wrap around to cover about one quarter of the edge with paint. This makes each pane appear to have a depth: although each colored area is a quite thin layer of paint, the way the paint goes around the edge creates the illusion that each area of color could instead be a quarter inch thick tile laid on a support.

This painting has four kinds of edges: 1] the frayed edge of color where the paint seeps out from hand-placed, non-square strips of tape used to define the colored areas (disrupted or imperfectly functioning technology); 2] the soft rounded edge where the canvas bends around to the side of the stretcher (mass produced readymade- industrial technology); 3] the brushy, crusty edge of paint on the side of the stretcher made by the action of making the painting (the eye-guided movement of the hand holding a medium-specific technolgy- the brush); and 4] the edge created where the back side of the stretcher meets the wall when it's hung (an effect incidental to architectural and electric technology).

There are six kinds of space in this painting: 1] the flat panes of roughly rectangular color on a flat plane (pictorial); 2] the overlapping of one pane over another, for example, the red on the top right is obviously on top of both the yellow and the umber areas (physical); 3] the push and pull of panes via the hue and intensity of color (chromatics); 4] the atmospheric space of the orange on the bottom that overlaps the umber which allows the original edge of umber and some of the umber to peek through the orange (painterly); 5] each colored pane's appearance as a thick slab or tile laid on a surface (illusion); and 6] the integrated object comprising wood, cloth, and paint that is independent from but hangs on a wall (holistic). All of these kinds of space are aspects representation.

The top and bottom sections are nearly identical in height. One can imagine mixing the yellow on the top left and the red on the top right to make the orange at the bottom. The umber band is a neutralizing gap between the two colors above mixing into the single color below. This gap does two things: it's a hollow space behind the other three colors; and it's a plaza, a place for the viewer to linger before moving to the top of the painting into a space made by the red and yellow.

Imagine that the yellow continues towards the right underneath the red. The red's left edge overlaps the yellow and hangs just a slight nudge down into the umber; it's in that little gap at the edge of the hanging red that a small entry opens into a narrow space between the yellow and red. The vertical edge of the red is not ninety degrees; it leans forward, like a door slightly ajar. This is the single occurence in the painting of a kind of constructed, architectural space into which the viewer can enter, first with the eyes, then in conscious recognition with imagination, and then with the body, even if it's just our face trying to peer around a corner, and even more if we feel ourselves pulled into this little space, shoulder leaning in, heel lifting in a light step forward. We can imagine ourselves slipping into that narrow space between yellow and red where the light of these two colors glows and reflect and becomes orange.

This is a painting of four colored panes that is arithmetically orange, and it is a painting of a hidden orange space. In this calculation and this allusion it contains the surprise of unexpected representation of color, space, and light that the viewer carries away from it.

Chris Ashley

Oakland, CA, September 2005

 

 

 

 

Richard Schur catalogues

 

 

I received a package the other day from Richard Schur: a painting and two catalogues. Read about the painting on another post.

The catalogues:

The Universial Painting catalogue for the exhibit of German painters touring museums in China:

The Munich School catalogue:

 

 

 

 

Untitled (Boy, Red Sweats, Gun)

 

 

 

Untitled (Boy, Red Sweats, Gun), 20050909, HTML & JPEG, 420 x 880 pixels (image used without permission)

 

 

 

 

Untitled 1-5

 

 

Untitled 1-5, 2005 (September), Pencil, watercolor & ink on paper, approx. 8.75 x 6.75" each (scanned)

 

 

 

 

Untitled (Bus, Car, Emergency Workers)

 

 

 

Untitled (Bus, Car, Emergency Workers), 20050908, HTML & JPEG, 500 x 640 pixels (image used without permission) 

 

 

 

Final Five Past Picks

 

 

These are the final five out of a thirty sort of "Best of" from the past nearly two years of daily HTML drawings. That's it. Tomorrow, a drawing.

 

 

8. Today in Iraq (May 12, 2005: Oil infrastructure attacked in Kirkuk), May 22, 2005, HTML, 522 x 600 pixels

 

 

 

 

Cinematic Dataculture (-empyre- 1), June 1, 2005, HTML, 505 x 475 pixels

 

 

 

 

Theoretically Motivated Camp (-empyre- 28), June 28, 2005, HTML 550 x 570 pixels

 

 

 

 

Five, July 27, 2005, HTML, 322 x 622 pixels

 

 

 

 

Four, July 28, 2005, HTML, 404 x 344 pixels

 

 

 

 

Chimney Rock 1-5

 

 

Chimney Rock 1-5, 2005 (August), Pencil, watercolor & ink on paper, approx. 8.75 x 6.75" each (scanned)

 

 

 

 

Five Additional Five Past Picks

 

 

These are five out of a thirty sort of "Best of" from the past nearly two years of daily HTML drawings.

 

Proposal for Four Windows, March 9, 2005, HTML, 260 x 180 pixels each

 

 

 

 

Opportunities 7 & 8, March 13, 2005, HTML, 220 x 260 pixels each

 

 

 

 

Willie McCovey, April 14, 2005, HTML, 540 x 180 pixels