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APPRECIATING NOLAND

ASYMMETRICAL SHAPES

THE SHAPED PAINTINGS (1974-81) take the relation between internal layout and external shape to a new level of interaction and complexity. In these drawing comes to the fore without any sacrifice of color. In earlier series drawing had a logical relation to internal divisions -- even in the needle diamonds. In the '70s "shapes" there's more of an equivalence, a stronger interaction.

In the "irregular shapes" (1974-79) internal drawing determines the picture shape in some instances while in others it responds to it. The external shape was at first drawn in response to internal divisions, often radiating bands or rays.

By the time of the "surfboards" (1979-81) the picture shape was imposed (drawn by a series of templates.) The "surfboards" are the last paintings in flat, unlayered color and sum up the relations between color and shape that dominated Noland's art to that point. Done on an intimate scale, roughly the size of an upright person, they recall the concentration and tension of the "needle diamonds." from a decade earlier.

Where Olitski from the same period used narrow formats to contain monochromatic surface variations, here Noland used panels of flat color enhanced by color fringes and stamped out by irregular shapes. Just big enough to "contain" a human figure, the "surfboards" present color against the wall as a refined presence.