Oil on canvas with wood frame
For Bess, to be an artist was to be “a conduit through which this thing, whatever it was, flowed.” His paintings—in which symbols appear atop expanses of color—were the direct result of visions he experienced; by recording them, he could begin to parse their meanings. Both of these paintings feature a curved line crossed by small marks: In Number 40, this sign resembles a scar, while in Untitled, it evokes a railroad track. To catalogue the significance of such elements, Bess made a “Primer of Basic Primordial Symbolism,” a key in which he assigned associations to various shapes and colors.
2025
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Gallery 407This phrase suggests the role of some artists as a guide or a beacon, pointing the way. It also refers to the visual languages of their work, in which symbols can efficiently distill complex ideas.
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