Making Connections

Sean Scully Art Horizon III

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Last semester in my Contemporary Art History class I learned about an artist named Sean Scully. We watched an Art 21 segment that started with him talking about his move from Ireland to Germany and how inspiring the landscapes were to him and his work. He continued about how he used to paint form the cityscapes in Ireland but he couldn't help but be moved by the landscapes that now surrounded him. He was fascinated with the colors, and the components of the scenes. At the time I wasn't familiar with his work, so when they moved to a scene of him working in his studio I was quite surprised to see that he is a colorist. At the time I wasn't really sure how I felt about his work. I often find it difficult to relate to minimalist work. Scully works on a huge scale with large blocks of color. He often creates patterns, especially checkerboard patterns that Scully relates to both the landscapes, and the current culture of his homeland, Ireland. In his previous work Sully would mask off the color blocks creating hard edges, but in his current work he leaves softer edges, allowing the colors to overlap.

In December I had the opportunity to see Scully's work first-hand at Art Basel in Miami. The scale alone was impressive. Having been exposed to his work just a few weeks earlier made me take pause to look more closely. Although I still didn't truly understand his work, I did have an understanding of his background and inspirations which made it more relatable. When I considered it more in terms of an impressionist painting it made more sense. While he is inspired by his surroundings, he breaks the images down to the most basic elements of colors.

Last week we had a visiting artist who looked at my more recent work and related the individual panels to  Scully's work. Until she pointed tis out, I never made the connection, but many of the individual panels do in fact resemble his work. At this point my plan is to work on the grid to create an image that I can relate to, then line the individual panels up creating an entirely new whole using the same components. The individual panels then become almost as important as the unit as a whole. I suddenly have a renewed interest in his work and feel his approach to his work can probably influence how I look at the individual panels I am working on.

Cyndy Epps, Empty Spaces