PROTON II 1966

This painting by Victor Vasarely is an arrangement of jewel-toned cubes, each a facet of blue, red, and green. I imagine Vasarely standing before the canvas, meticulously planning out this grid of color. What a challenge to get it just so! He’s like an architect in a way, carefully constructing a world that plays with our perception. The way the colors shift and change, I can almost feel the artist considering the impact of each hue and where to place it. It reminds me a little of Josef Albers and his homages to the square. Painting can feel a lot like a puzzle. A back and forth between the artist and the work, trying to fit the pieces together until they resonate. It becomes about this conversation with the history of painting, too, thinking about what’s been done and what is left to discover.