Both paintings (white/blue & black/red) were deliberately designed to emulate, to celebrate and call attention to a truly innovative and historic piece of music. The abstract painting base of the 2 works gives a nod to the non-representational paintings of Gerhardt Richter, also a 20th century innovator, who acknowledged to the composer that he often listens to this particular work when he paints.

An amalgamation of 2 non-representational paintings of opposite tones, this artwork portrays a slightly distorted keyboard, from the musician’s point of view. Because there are 12 parts to this musical work by Steve Reich (2 pulses, 10 sections), and 12 physical keys in an octave (without repeating – 7 white, 5 black), there are 12 “panels” here.

Dichotomy is echoed from the musical piece (with its 2 kinds of time: rhythmic pulse and wind/voice) by not only the obvious difference in tones (the white, cool keys against the dark, warm sharps), but also the juxtaposition of the collaged sheet music (vertical) to the layout of the keyboard (horizontal). Visually, they seem to crawl across the canvas and represent time, our most precious commodity.

Chords, musical staffs and rhythmic directions are clearly legible but do not block the non-representational/minimalistic abstract backgrounds. They signify the importance of written music (and subsequently of the publishing of musical scores) historically, in learning about music, in learning how to play an instrument, for understanding the piece itself, for performance, and to inspire the future development of music in general).

Image #: 8059

Size: 21cm x 30cm

Medium: Mixed media and collage on card

Price: £150.00