A Vacant Mind: Minimalist Artist Agnes Martin
I recently saw an interview with artist Agnes Martin. It was my first introduction to her work. I loved her simple insights on the benefits of a vacant mind. After seeing the video (posted below) I did a little more research on her work.
Her signature style is defined by an emphasis upon line, grids, and fields of extremely subtle color. While minimalist in form, these paintings were quite different in spirit from those of her other minimalist counterparts, retaining small flaws and unmistakable traces of the artist’s hand; she shied away from intellectualism, favoring the personal and spiritual. Her paintings, statements, and influential writings often reflect an interest in Eastern philosophy, especially Taoism. Because of her work’s added spiritual dimension, which became more and more dominant after 1967, she preferred to be classified as an abstract expressionist. When she died at age 92, she was said to have not read a newspaper for the last 50 years.
Martin worked only in black, white, and brown before moving to New Mexico. During this time, she introduced light pastel washes to her grids, colors that shimmered in the changing light.
Sister Wendy Beckett, in her book American Masterpieces, said about Martin: “Agnes Martin often speaks of joy; she sees it as the desired condition of all life. The work awes, not just with its delicacy, but with its vigor, and this power and visual interest is something that has to be experienced.”
