Ah, I found it! This is the 1964 Jules Olitski painting from the exhibition "Color as Field," reviewed with a slide show in today's New York Times, that I saw just after discovering the amazing work of Rowland Ricketts at Ricketts Indigo. Here they are side by side:
Jules Olitski, Cleopatra's Flesh, 1964
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Untitled Obi Yardage, 2002, indigo and charcoal dyed hemp kibira, paste resist |
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I love seeing these together. Completed nearly a half century apart, each is unique yet each uses similar elemental shapes and curves, with the deep flat saturated blue planes encircling the desired dots. These pieces have a lot of presence and power. It feels like you just become the color. It would be so interesting to curate an exhibition of textile artists paired with art in other media -- it's been done before but it's always fascinating to me. It's so important to always be looking -- to see a lot of work of all kinds.
After I first posted about his work, Rowland Ricketts sent me a very courteous e-mail, appreciating the concept of Slow Cloth. He and Chinami are now in Indiana, and he is teaching at Indiana University.
The Olitski is currently at the Frist in Nashville TN. It is so very impressive in person - I'm grateful I saw it in person before seeing it in a photo. Stunning.
Posted by: Kathy | August 30, 2008 at 12:27 PM