Contemporary Abstract Expressionism I Yellow Horizon

Two bold horizontal bands cut across the middle of this painting: a stripe of bright cobalt blue, and directly below it a thicker stripe of strong yellow. They act as a horizon and divide the canvas into two very different halves. Above the bands, the surface is pale and weathered. Whites, greys, and soft browns are scraped and rubbed thin so the canvas weave shows through, with patches of yellow on the left and a tall dark blue-grey column rising in the centre. A thin white cross sits inside that column, like a mast or a window frame. Below the bands, the painting turns dark. A wide field of black and deep navy fills the lower third, with thin lines of yellow dripping down through it. At the very bottom the dark breaks up into grey and muted gold, like reflections on wet ground. The contrast between the rough, pale upper half and the heavy, dark lower half gives the painting real weight. It reads as a field of rapeseed under a grey sky, city lights across dark water at night, or a shoreline at dusk.