Untitled 1971

This untitled painting was made by Simon Hantai, and what strikes me is how he was probably led by the material and the movement of his own hand in the process. The light blue and yellow that peaks out from beneath the white creates the feeling of light, and makes the shapes dance. Hantai, like me, was interested in the way the physicality of paint shapes our experience. He's famous for his folding technique - "pliage" - and in this painting, the white shapes are areas that were revealed after a process of folding and crumpling the canvas. I can imagine him thinking about Matisse's cut-outs, but instead of adding shapes, he’s subtracting, revealing what's underneath. What could have been going through his mind as he worked? I'm sure he was thinking about the history of painting, and about different ways of seeing and experiencing. I bet Hantai was having a lot of fun, allowing room for chance and accident.