Espaces concertés 

Editor: This is "Espaces concertés" by Francis Bott. It's an acrylic painting in the style of geometric abstraction. It feels very... deliberate. All clean lines and flat planes of color. How would you interpret this work? Curator: The geometry certainly projects order, doesn't it? But I'm intrigued by the title: "concerted spaces." Notice how the planes seem to fold in and out, suggesting a stage. Do you see how the flat shapes simultaneously imply depth, even a kind of performance? Editor: I do, now that you mention it! So, are you saying these shapes are stand-ins for performers on a stage? Curator: It’s a possibility! And perhaps even a symbolic representation of collaboration. Concerted action relies on agreement and working in unison. Note the carefully placed blocks of colour, balancing each other within the larger field. How do they make you feel? Editor: Balanced, I think. Although there's tension too, in the sharper shapes, and how they nearly touch. Like notes in a chord that create harmony and discordance at the same time. Curator: Precisely! Visual languages evolve and take on meaning. Think about hard-edge painting’s relationship to early computer graphics. Perhaps Bott anticipated the clean, defined realities we inhabit now in the digital world. Do you think these colours represent technology, or nature, or both? Editor: I hadn't thought about a digital connection. It does feel prescient. I think both the technological and natural are possible because they’re often synthesized in contemporary culture. I learned to read visual culture by thinking about how it is constantly re-interpreting history! Curator: Absolutely, seeing how historical references constantly reinvent themselves in contemporary art is very helpful.