Amy 2006

Denise Green made this etching, ‘Amy’, with line and ink on paper. It's a kind of study in letting go, a single bloom in yellow, caught in a web of lines. The yellow feels like a sustained note, almost humming. The ink is so light it’s barely there, it’s almost a drawing of a memory of a flower. Notice how she’s layered the lines to build up the form, especially around the head of the flower. It feels like Green is exploring a feeling, letting it loop and repeat. There’s no erasing here, just adding and adding. In the stem you can see the fine, scratchy quality of the line; it makes me think about Cy Twombly's scribbles, there is that same feeling of not quite holding on, and letting the work be uncertain. Looking at this piece, I remember that art is never about getting it ‘right’ but letting the process take you somewhere new.