Abstraction 1962

Robert Mallary made this striking black and white abstraction using ink on paper. Look at the sweeping brushstrokes that define the upper section—you can almost feel the artist's hand moving across the surface. It’s kind of moody, right? I can imagine Mallary wrestling with the composition, adding and subtracting lines, letting the ink bleed and pool in unpredictable ways. The vertical lines in the lower half feel like a forest or maybe even prison bars. The whole composition has a kind of push-pull thing going on. That broad stroke at the top battles against the more defined and darker marks below. Mallary’s work reminds me of Franz Kline’s bold, gestural paintings. Both artists share a love for the expressive potential of black and white. It's like they're having a conversation across time, each pushing the boundaries of abstraction. It's a reminder that art is never created in a vacuum. We build on what came before, interpreting and reinventing the language of painting with our own voices.