Untitled (Sunset Series 32 ) 1965

John Altoon made this painting, Untitled (Sunset Series 32), with paint on canvas and what a gorgeous colour palette! It’s like he’s just letting the colours hang out together, seeing what they can do. The making of art is a process, it’s a journey that doesn’t always have a fixed destination, more a sense of putting one foot in front of the other to see where it may lead. Look at the juicy surface and the way that Altoon applies the paint, thick and opaque, almost like frosting. It looks like he’s used a brush for the pink circle, but maybe a palette knife to apply the orange squiggles, so simple and child like. Each mark feels very physical and tactile, as if I could reach out and touch it, which of course I can’t. Think of Joan Miró, and the way that his paintings also embrace a playful freedom. In both artists work there is an invitation to embrace ambiguity and find our own meanings. Art isn’t a puzzle to be solved, it's more a conversation to be had, where the viewer is just as important as the artist in deciding what a painting might be about.