Pouring Acrylic

In my poured works I apply acrylic paint to raw unstretched canvas in order to create composed works of high-impact color. This involves controlling the flow of acrylic through changing the viscosity of the liquid acrylics and using strategies to apply resistance to the flow of paint.

In doing so, I may angle, contort, or flatten the canvas. As paint streams, action is taken to divert its natural course or stop it all together. Paint mixtures are formulated so they glide on the top layer of the canvas rather than fully saturating it, leaving behind a history of the path of each flow of paint.

I accept the randomness inherent in using a liquid medium where gestures never show a 1:1 relationship between intent and achievement, and follow each new pour with time for reassessment, providing an opportunity to take further action, or non-action, to achieve compositional balance. The presence of a single color may include one, or more than 15 individual pours of paint.

Conceptually this work both draws from, and departs from, that of the color field painters Ellsworth Kelly and Morris Louis. In the case of Kelly, I adopted Kelly’s concept of using color for color’s sake and Kelly’s approach of making abstract shapes hard edged, but depart from Kelly by co-mingling colors to highlight contextual differences in color perception. In relation to Louis, I use similar techniques in the pouring of acrylic media onto raw canvas to create swaths of high contrast colors, but depart by increasing color opacity and in the deconstruction of form.

Philosophically this work explores the intersections of random and planned action and I view it as a metaphor for attempting to live with intention while accepting unforeseen events and finding a new balance to live well.