Untitled 1989

This is an untitled piece by Sam Francis. He made it using, from what I can see, ink and watercolour. You can see the splatters, drips and pools of colour, that’s the fun of art making, it’s a real process! Francis's work is so full of light and colour. Look at the way the colours bleed into each other, creating these luminous effects. The paint is really thin and transparent. It feels like you could almost reach out and touch it. There's this great black swoop in the centre, anchoring the whole composition and giving it some real oomph. It’s as if the black helps bring the painting into focus. Francis always reminds me of Joan Miró with his playful energy and love of biomorphic shapes. But where Miró is all about playful surrealism, Francis is more interested in the pure joy of colour and light. It's a reminder that art is an ongoing conversation, a constant exchange of ideas and inspiration, it can be whatever you interpret from it.