Fine Art by Sara M. Zak: On Philip Guston

Voyage, 1956 by Philip Guston

I was in Baltimore a few weeks back for just a day, but I stopped into the FREE Baltimore Museum of Art and was reminded just how influential Philip Guston has been to my thought process as I paint. A long while ago I read a book, Philip Guston: Collected Writings, Lectures, and Conversations , and I think that it should be required reading for all painters. Before reading the book, I had enjoyed the above piece at the Albright Knox for it's palette and brush work, but I didn't realize the depth of thought behind Guston's painting process over the course of his career. Guston's eradication of color or marks or subject matter from his canvases make his work about the journey -- the history of paint is on the canvas. He thought in-depth about paint, what makes a painting, the purpose of paint and the place of painting in modern art. He repeatedly went back through the history of painting to inform his work, including Piero de Francesco, Mantegna, Goya, Manet and Cezanne. Guston's book sent me on many investigations into the same subject matter and helped me solidify paint as a medium I will utilize and defend as relevant. As a representational artist who believes that great representational art is also abstract art, I find that erasures and letting the picture live it's own life are really important to me. I think reading the Guston book helped me articulate, both in words and paint, my own process of working from a plan to abandoning the plan to allowing the picture to form itself -- sometimes it even returns to the plan after seeking other ways first. Guston shares a metaphor of having the plan of climbing Mount Everest and almost reaching the top, then thinking "I forgot some supplies," turning around, but finding new paths down the hill, making new discoveries; the experience of the climb wasn't about reaching the top even though that was the plan -- it is about all the things that happen when we change direction. I find it intriguing that two of the abstract painters I admire most, Guston and Diebenkorn, both returned to figuration and representation at some point in their careers. While in Baltimore, I saw "The Oracle" from 1974. It is part of a series of work that uses the KKK as characters in a story -- Guston states that he was interested in evil, but wanted to think about what evil did when it wasn't planning evil thing -- evil having dinner, looking art, etc. As an artist whose work has been socially conscious, I find this narrative intriguing. His distance from activism and his humor are important elements to this work.