An essay written by Phillip Barcio
Phillip Barcio is an art journalist and fiction author based in Evanston, Illinois. Among other excellent publications, his writing has appeared in Western Humanities Review, Hyperallergic, Momus, The Michigan Quarterly Review, Tikkun, New Art Examiner, IdeelArt, WIDEWALLS, AMA Art Basel Magazine, Paris Photo Magazine, La Gazette Drouot, PATTERN, Space Squid, the Swamp Ape Review, various museum and gallery exhibition catalogues, and is included in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art.
Proof of Nature:
Manifestation of Conditions in New Paintings by Jeremy Annear
Phillip Barcio
Nota futura: this essay was composed during the middle weeks of the COVID-19 outbreak, in self-isolation, at a small desk beside a bank of windows looking out at a row of houses filled with similarly isolated souls seated at their own small desks, gazing out their own windows, all of us alone together. There’s no sense in ignoring this detail of history. In fact, it might be perilous to. Will we be proud or ashamed of how we behave during this trial? This is proof that art and writing continued to matter to some of us, and so, should probably still matter to some of you.
As for myself, I feel privileged to have this work to focus on, and to still be working at all while so many others have lost their livelihoods. I also feel a responsibility to provide the best answer I can to an obvious question: what is worth saying about abstract art while human kind is being brought to its knees by a deadly, novel, fast-spreading virus?
If my work is impotent against existential threats, what value does it truly have?
I offer only the smallest answer—small, but undeniable:
We are all part of the world, and part of nature, and if our work is, too, then it should not stop until everything stops.
Structure and Feeling
That we are one with the ecosphere is a truth repeated insistently throughout the works that are the main subject of this essay: the rustic yet luminous, recent paintings of Jeremy Annear. People like Annear, who work everyday with pigment and light—pushing paint across empty surfaces, searching for equilibrium—know intimately how temperamental the elements are. If they learn to work with the living world instead of against it, they discover that humanity is not separate from nature, but proof of it, and their paintings express that ancient knowledge.
Nature’s geometry is as evident in Annear’s new paintings as it is in dust particles on the moon, or on the velvet leaves of the sage in my herb garden.
The Siesta Song series (I, II and III) evokes mid-day in the mediterranean countryside, as folds in space, gentle divots, and illusionist layers emerge and retreat amid shadows and light.
Bolero I 70 x 50cm Oil on Canvas
Bolero I and Bolero II map the sensuous undulation of interlocked human forms, the oscillating tempo of waves massaging the shore, or the gentle sway of wind-caressed palm fronds.
Embrace II and Embrace III welcome us into gentle, interlocking hugs, while Sea Wall, Nocturnal Muse, Camaret-sur-mer I and Camaret-sur-mer II read like weathered beach signs in a hidden, seaside town.
I could go on, so ample are the correlations my memory finds between these paintings and the reality it expects, yet, my intellect reminds me that these paintings don’t represent something—they are something.
“I have gone through a stage of abstracting objects to what I now feel is a place of pure abstraction,” Annear says.
What I am talking about, then, is not the stuff that I see, or think I see, but the feelings it evokes within.
Paintings such as Contra Tone III and Roscoff I, with their subtle, incidental declaration that existence extends beyond what is visible, fill me with mystery, and a little hope.
Semaphore I, with its supergraphic urgency, brings me back to the here and now.
Currently my favorite among Annear’s new works is Earth Tango I. Its planar mysteries state quite well the confusion we—all of us—now find ourselves in at the end of the Anthropocene. The patriarchy, haughty and inexperienced, has been hurling Sister Earth around the dance floor, attempting to force its intentions onto its partner. Now here we are in a crumpled heap. Time to let the feminine take charge; feel her intentions; flow with them; stop fighting her lead.
These abstract expressions remind us that the shape of power is less important than the power of shapes.
A Night in Chelsea
Although I’ve been writing about his work for some years, it was only recently that I had the opportunity to actually meet Jeremy Annear face to face. Back in October 2019, I happened to be in London for Frieze Masters, and Annear unexpectedly reached out and invited me for a tipple at the Chelsea Arts Club, where he’s a member. As I rode the Tube from Regent’s Park, passing hundreds of neighborhood pubs where a pleasant evening almost certainly awaited almost any stranger, I found myself worrying whether it was a mistake to spend one of my few nights in London trying to socialize with an artist whose work I admired. Would he come off as academic, pedantic, or overly serious? Would I say the wrong thing and bruise his ego? Would he be unlikable, and cause me to mirror that unlikability? Or would we get on too well, and end up on an all night bender? (Past experience raised all of these concerns.)
Thankfully, I pushed onward, because the artist I met that night in Chelsea was as welcoming and gregarious as a berry farmer. If he had been wearing overalls and a hat, I would have gladly followed him into the field to share his toil. Instead, he was wearing a jacket and slacks, and had a bottle of wine already open at a table in the garden when I arrived. After pouring me a glass, his first words were not about himself nor his work, but rather questions about me: how was my trip going; how are my wife and dog; what had I seen so far that I liked at the fair? When the conversation did finally turn to him, he mentioned his art practice only briefly, just to say that he was excited about what he had been painting lately, and to ask if I wouldn’t mind too terribly much trying to write something about the new work. Then he showed me photos of his dog, shared stories about his family, and we philosophized about our mutual concerns for our loved ones, and for our fragile world. As the temperature dropped, we headed inside for fish and chips and a couple of pints, which we devoured to the not-unpleasant Londoner-twangs of a local Johnny Cash cover band.
That Annear would invite me all the way out to Chelsea to ask me in person to write about his new work, but then not talk to me about that work, might seem odd. But I’ve come to realize that talking about family, dogs, music and humanity’s relationship with the environment is, in fact, talking about the work.
Annear’s new paintings
Annear’s new paintings are as straightforward as ripe pieces of fresh fruit at the grocery—almost glowing from within, attracting us closer with their strange shapes, luminous colors and tactile surfaces. No need to over-analyze them. We don’t ask the farmer, “What is the meaning of this fruit?” Just devour them, and let them nourish you. That’s what they’re there for.
What plans preceded these paintings? What led Annear to sense when they were finished? What fleeting thoughts and feelings visited him as he labored? These things are lost, and are almost always invisible to viewers anyway. The viewing has little to do with making. Asking the artist to explain the content in a purely abstract painting is tantamount to asking them to lie.
Moving elements around in search of the right light; feeling the welcome weight of time-worn tools; trusting their intuition and personal experience as much as they trust science. A farmer pushes dirt around; a painter pushes paint around.
What I am most enamored with about Annear’s new work is that it feels sensible and structured, but also free. Annear is painting with a mixture of feeling and surprise. Beautiful, unexpected, unfamiliar, sometimes inexplicable things are happening during the process. He is a participant along with nature in the manifestation of conditions that result in the development of something precious, even mystic: an image object; the final stage of an ancient and natural process of nurturing and growth.
Conclusion
This brings me back to the question of the value of what I am doing here. It’s easy to argue in favor of the importance of abstract art at a time of existential crisis: it enlarges our perspective, brings us closer to our intuition, and reminds us things are not always what they seem. But the writing sometimes seems the least necessary part of the whole thing. I’m like the grocer pointing out that the apples are red, the oranges are juicy, and the lettuce is crispy and green. Even as I ramble on, I wonder, do you really see what I see, or feel what I feel?
I conclude that all I’m doing here is asking good questions. What is inevitable? What can we make happen? What should we stop trying to make happen? Our answers depend on how well we understand what we are. With this new body of work, Jeremy Annear is offering us small chances to get to know ourselves by letting color, texture, shape, line, form and light point the way. That’s all human culture is, really: what we know ourselves by. For what it’s worth, I believe our willingness to engage in that conversation is tied to all of the other challenges we face.
Phillip Barcio
Phillip Barcio is an art journalist and fiction author based in Evanston, Illinois. Among other excellent publications, his writing has appeared in Western Humanities Review, Hyperallergic, Momus, The Michigan Quarterly Review, Tikkun, New Art Examiner, IdeelArt, WIDEWALLS, AMA Art Basel Magazine, Paris Photo Magazine, La Gazette Drouot, PATTERN, Space Squid, the Swamp Ape Review, various museum and gallery exhibition catalogues, and is included in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art. He hosts the weekly radio program Apocalypse Mixtape, on which contemporary artists share their thoughts on the word apocalypse, along with the songs they would put on their apocalypse mixtape.