A closer look · A ranked selection
Ten ways to see differently.
From a bathroom to a universe: a journey through colour, pattern and altered space.
In this selection
- 01Chromo Thriller #3Miles Aldridge
- 02A Terrible Beauty is BornMary Sibande
- 03Indication and EmergenceKeiichi Tanaami
- 04Installation at Beyond the Streets London, Saatchi GalleryFelipe Pantone
- 05Kunstformen der Natur, Tafel 49: Actiniae (Seeanemonen)Ernst Haeckel
- 06The Spirits of the Pumpkins Descended into the HeavensYayoi Kusama
- 07The Swimming PoolLeandro Erlich
- 08Norman (A cat in 'gothic' style)Louis Wain
- 09Glory Be to GodGeorgiana Houghton
- 10Rythme n°1, décoration pour le Salon des TuileriesRobert Delaunay
Start with something recognisable. Follow a colour, then a shape. By the final work, see whether the ordinary looks quite the same.
Ten works, in an editorial reading order.
Disclosure
An Artzine editorial selection. Inclusion does not imply an artist’s endorsement.
About this selection
A subjective route from familiar settings to intricate abstraction. The sequence is a way of looking, not a ranking of artists.
A blank-faced woman with teased yellow hair stands in a green-tiled bathroom in a sheer pink slip, pointing a pink hairdryer at her head beside a red towel.
Start with a familiar setting and notice the details that make it feel unfamiliar.
Sophie stands eyes closed in a purple tendril-covered gown with a white cloth streaming from her head, purple roots writhing around her against a wall of purple ruching.
Move from the setting to the figure: how do colour and form change its presence?
A three-panel canvas in pink, beige and coral crowded with eyeball-faced skulls, a red flying saucer, a robot-tentacled orb and a green-hooded figure before a city.
Let your eye wander through the competing shapes before trying to read the whole image.
Six coiled sculptures in blue, orange, purple, cyan, red and yellow stand on blurred black-and-white plinths in a room whose floor and walls carry pixel-noise and QR patterns, with two spectral pixel paintings on the walls.
Watch the boundary between colour and pattern. Notice where one becomes the other.
A full-page colour plate of sea anemones in red, yellow, green and violet against a dark seabed, headed Haeckel, Kunstformen der Natur, Tafel 49 and captioned Actiniae, Seeanemonen.
Slow down and compare the forms: repetition leaves room for extraordinary differences.
Looking into a mirrored chamber, glowing yellow pumpkins covered in black dots repeat to infinity under orange light.
Follow a repeated shape until it starts to change your sense of the space.
A small child in a red jacket sits on the floor of a bright blue pool, looking up at a rippling water surface that forms the ceiling.
Look for the visual clue that unsettles your first impression.
A turquoise cat with wide yellow eyes stares out from a deep blue ground, its fur drawn as white lace-like tracery with small red and pink accents.
Trace the rhythm of the image and notice what your eye returns to.
A dense abstract sheet of looping white lines over swirling bands of red, yellow, blue and green, with spiral clusters and a pale circle near the top left.
Choose one line and follow it through the composition.
A huge near-square panel of overlapping concentric discs and arcs in red, blue, yellow, green, grey and black, with a rainbow fan converging at the centre.
Finish with the relationship between neighbouring colours, then look back at the first work.
Keep what
moves you.
Your eye makes the connections.
A zine gives them a home.