Contributor: Amanda King (Studio Consultant, Sterling, VA.)

While visiting Paris two weeks ago, Heidi and I visited Le Centre Pompidou, one of the most daring modern art museums in the world. We happened upon a temporary exhibit of an artist whose name was unknown to me, Pierre Soulages. This large scale retrospective featured over 100 paintings and 60 years worth of work from France’s most famous abstract artist. Pierre Soulages is known as “the painter of black.”

At first glance it was easy to see the consistent theme of his work, the universal use of the color black dominated the exhibit. We meandered silently, taking in the extent of this mysterious artists work. What at first seemed to be elementary works of art, started to unfold as unique pieces different in size, texture, and format. Some canvases were hung by cables from the ceiling and painted on both sides. One work has consistent horizontal lines; another has soft diagonal lines that fold like fabric.

“Is this art? But it is so simple. I could do that!” Common thoughts shared by all first time viewers, including myself. But something about this exhibit lingered with me and two weeks later I am still thinking about the “painter of black.”

Why is Pierre Soulages so famous? His paintings represent nothing.

Exactly. Like many abstract painters Soulages says “He doesn’t represent, he presents.” It is the way the light hits the canvas, the shadows that are created from the texture created from built up oil paint. Critics may try to look deeper into his work and see the “fallen silence created” or “a battleground between shadow and light.” Or, like me, you could look and say nothing.

For Soulages, “a painting is an organisation, a set of relationships between shapes, lines and coloured surfaces, on which the meanings which we give it are made and undone.” In a world of constant noise and distraction, I found the silence of these paintings refreshing, an opportunity to clear your mind and think about black.

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