Adolph Gottlieb

Like Rothko, Gottlieb was a member of the New York School of artists, whose work is variously characterised by its abstraction, large fields of colour and attention to the physical act of putting paint on canvas. Gottlieb professed a spiritual closeness to primitive and archaic art, reflected in the iconography of his pictograph paintings of the 1940s. This work is typical of his later, larger paintings, which feature informal shapes, stained, splashed or brushed onto unprimed canvas. Despite their simple forms, these paintings suggest a range of references or moods, including the natural world, spiritual transcendence and volatile or explosive forces.

Gallery label, September 2004

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