MARINA ADAMS

For Paris, Adams deploys soft power (the title of her 2017 exhibition at Salon 94) and her feature painting—Who’s Afraid of The Red White and Blue shifts our expectations of this color combination. The patriotic red stripe of the American (and French) flag is replaced with curving shapes in a deep maroon and—as the title also puns—a Barnett Newman yellow. A magician of color, her paintings vibrate with these conflicting sources to find spiritual harmony.

Adams’ paper practice allows her to develop new visual patterns and thought; a grid of nine new flashe works are shown alongside her larger works on linen. These works introduce a series of horizontal waves—newly born yellows and purples hug black on a wild meander to a new place. A consummate student, Adams mines multiple cultures, synching and distilling gesture and pattern. A Moroccan textile, a Moorish column, an amphora silhouette, and a Matisse cut-out all commingle, collapsing time. In Adams’ hands, cultural patterns repeat—binding us together. Marina Adams’ (b. 1960) paintings display the artist’s deft use of color.

Fluently pushing color into form, Adams creates undulating, interlocking shapes that reveal a powerful internal rhythm beneath their surface simplicity. As the artist puts it, “Meaning and intellect in abstract art can be difficult to locate, as there is no narrative to lead us into it. It is like the voice itself. I use pattern and color to create the voice. And I use structure and form to channel it.” The artist’s vibrant compositions use saturated shades and sensual shapes to pack a graphic punch. While purely abstract, the works’ organic, free-flowing patterns are redolent of landscapes or bodies.

Unlike many contemporary artists, who deliberately blur the line between figuration and abstraction, Adams’ current work is unabashedly—and exuberantly—abstract, allowing the artist to play with sheer color, form, and pattern. Her work bears a Matisse-like connection to the intricate patterns of textiles; there is also a resonance with the rich designs of Moroccan rugs—and for that matter, those of Sonia Delaunay. Another inspiration for the artist has been Moorish mosaics, such as the magnificent tessellated walls in the Alhambra palace in Granada, Spain.

Adams has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions, including In the Garden of My Memory, Longlati Foundation, Shanghai (CN) in 2023; and FOCUS: Marina Adams, The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth (TX) in 2020. The artist’s work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York (NY); the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth (TX); the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (NY); and the Longlati Foundation, Shanghai (CN).