Abstract Series 2003-4-10 2003

Yu Youhan made this painting in 2003-4, probably in his studio, with brushes and paint of course. I am imagining Yu, in the studio, making all these marks, one after the other, and all of them are slightly different; some are a bit grey, some black, or even blue. He is building up a field of marks, and I guess he just kept at it, intuitively. I know that place so well, it’s like the painting tells you what it needs next. I wonder if he thought about patterns in nature when he made this. I love how the colour creates a feeling of looking at a rippling field. It makes me think of Agnes Martin, who made simple grid paintings, but I also think of Chinese landscape painting. Painters are always looking at each other's work and passing on ideas, even unconsciously. The best thing about painting is that it’s never really pinned down, it just keeps expanding outwards into new forms.