Midtown Seagram with Flourescents 1999

Sarah Morris's Midtown Seagram with Flourescents is a 48 inch by 48 inch painting, but when it was made is unknown. Morris lays down these grids and intersecting diagonals. How do you make such a thing? You decide on a color, the deep maroon of the grid, and you just commit. It must feel so rational, so architectural. Then she fills in these shapes with a restricted palette—pale yellow, beige, khaki, muted green. I love how flat it is. I imagine her taping it off, leaning in, filling in the shapes. It’s almost like she's building a world, brick by brick, color by color. The diagonals keep throwing the grid off. It almost flips into an illusion of depth, then back again. I get hints of Mondrian and Op Art here. There's a conversation happening across time, all these painters playing with form, color, and perception. It's a reminder that painting is this ongoing experiment, full of possibilities.