Sixth Station 1962

Barnett Newman made this painting, Sixth Station, with oil on canvas. It's mostly off-white, except for a band of dark colour at the left and a thin vertical line that divides the canvas. Imagine him in the studio, stepping back, squinting, making tiny adjustments to that stripe. Was he thinking about the sublime, about history, about god? That vertical line, or ‘zip’ as he called it, feels like a charged moment—a single, decisive gesture. You can almost see him wrestling with it, trying to get it just right. I imagine the painting not so much as a statement, but as a site of inquiry. A question mark in paint. I mean, all painters are in conversation with each other, across time, across movements. Newman was inspired by Mondrian, Rothko, Malevich... and then he turned around and inspired a whole bunch of other painters! It is a constant exchange, and this piece continues that exchange. Painting is an embodied expression, embracing ambiguity, allowing for multiple interpretations.