Working on several canvases simultaneously, Varda Caivano builds layers of paint that she then scratches, rubs, and reworks. Although abstract and untitled, many of Caivano's paintings have been described as evoking nature.
Read MoreThe colour palettes of Caivano's work vary, though they are often monochromatic or complementary within each canvas. Greens dominate an untitled painting from 2010, as do blues with small areas of yellow in a canvas from 2013. Expanses of blue cover an oil-and-charcoal work from 2016, over which Caivano has made black stripes that allow other colours—grey, purple, muted green, and orange—to peek through.
Usually modest in scale, Caivano's paintings prompt a close and prolonged study of colour relationships, brush strokes and marks, recalling familiar shapes in their abstract compositions. Common evocations include nature: in Untitled (2004), the diagonal strokes of yellow and brown could be said to create an architectural shape, with the triangle of blue and purple in the background describing the sky.
Caivano herself has often said that she regards her paintings as 'thoughts'—as things that are abstract and constantly in flux, becoming or returning to something else, moving in non-linear paths. Allowing the spectator to mediate their own relationships with the work, Caivano's paintings generate subjective experiences and chains of associations.
