Untitled 1999

This 'Untitled' painting by Phil Sims is built from layers of dark and muted browns, worked into a smooth surface. I can imagine Sims in the studio, mixing the dark pigments, then layering them on top of one another, shifting the tone, waiting, then doing it again. I wonder if the artist felt like he was building something from the ground up, like an excavation. It's an earth-tone monochrome, but the surface is teeming with light, a by-product of the waxiness and the layering. It feels both very material and very ethereal, like a memory. That single off-white brushstroke in the bottom left corner feels very deliberate, somehow. It draws attention to the physicality of the paint, reminding us that it's not just color, it's also texture, and that it's the texture that gives the painting its richness. Painters are constantly in conversation with each other, playing with color, pushing the boundaries of what it means to make a mark.