MICHAEL SIMPSON

Over the course of his more than 60-year artistic career, Simpson has focused on what he describes as ‘the mechanics of painting’—that is, how paintings are actually built, and how they affect people’s viewing—the principal subject of his oeuvre. Simpson usually works on large canvases, with a limited palette and formal restraint, forming a distinctive artistic language.

‘Squint Paintings’ (2009–present) are one of Simpson’s primary ongoing series. In medieval churches throughout Europe, a ‘squint’ is the architectural feature of a narrow opening that was used to allow leprosy patients and other ‘undesirables’ to witness sermons from the outside. In this series, the squint appears as a narrow, dark rectangular aperture placed high up, along with a variety of architectural forms for access, including platforms, steps, ladders, and rungs. Every form on his canvas is reduced to its essential geometry, giving his paintings a silent and austere quality. In contrast to what is evident in his apparent critique of organized religion and the politics of belief, Simpson emphasizes on a more metaphysical proposition beyond the subject.

There is a mysterious squint in each painting that invites viewers to approach, but even with the assistance of the ascent structures, it remains a metaphor for the inaccessible void that we cannot comprehend. As with the squint’s historical function of exclusion, the structure of the painting confines the viewer to the outside as well. This seemingly tangible aperture leads to a black unknown, which illustrates Simpson’s description of what he referred to as ‘a terrible effort to get to something which gives nothing’; Simpson illustrates his own bewilderment regarding the infinite space in which we exist, something which he believes troubles us all to some degree.

Despite the absence of human presence in his paintings, the use of large canvas creates the illusion that the viewer can enter the constructed room depicted in the work. Platforms, steps, and ladders which can be seen everywhere in daily life, is then placed in similarly pared-down settings as if within yet another white cube. Simpson’s paintings evoke the fundamental feelings to ascend and emotions associated with human experience and perception.

As well as focusing on the composition of the major objects in the space, he also pays attention to the subtle nuances of lighting, shading, and position. The two Confessionals are virtually identical, but the most significant differences are the nature of the two reds at the top of the paintings. He believes that at any one point during the making of a painting there is a multiplicity of different decisions to make, which may be major or minute changes. Two seemingly repeated scenes will lead to different impressions after one variable changes. The two Confessionals illuminate the work in different ways. Throughout Simpson’s works, his acute sensibility to balance elegance and integrity plays a significant role in building ‘the mechanics of painting’, which is the consistent endeavor in his artistic practice.