My Secret Garden - Mosaic 2018

Arne Quinze made this artwork, My Secret Garden, as a mosaic. The colours feel both lurid and inviting, a bit like a candy shop – or a hothouse. There is so much paint loaded onto the surface that each mark becomes a kind of gesture or event, and you can imagine the artist building the image one daub at a time. It has the feeling of abstract expressionism, except instead of going for the big sublime gesture, Quinze goes for the accumulation of many, many small gestures. Look at the way the artist has used thick impasto to capture the light, especially towards the middle of the canvas. It reminds me a little of Van Gogh’s late paintings of flowers, where the paint becomes almost sculptural. Both artists transform the act of seeing into a physical experience. I see a lot of dialogue between artists across time and genres. It is like one big, ongoing conversation.