WHERE WE'RE HEADED

WHERE WE’RE HEADED

David Park: A Retrospective @ SFMOMA, San Francisco

Through January 18, 2021 // sfmoma.org

“As you grow older, it dawns on you that you are yourself—that your job is not to force yourself into a style, but to do what you want.” Not quite 40, David Park, a professor at the California School of Fine Arts, a master of colorful abstraction, loaded his 1935 Ford, crammed with non-figurative canvases, drove out to a local dumpsite, did the deed, and drove back in a car devoid of said cargo. With full command of bold strokes and rich, dramatic impact of color, he wanted to paint what felt “natural … subjects that I know and care about,” in his case, friends and family who surrounded him, musical tableaux that recreated the rhythmic tempo of playing jazz with colleagues, and the swimmers and sunbathers who recalled his boyhood summers in Peterborough, New Hampshire. A natural draftsman who swore off the glasses prescribed for limited vision, Park literally drew from memory and drew from all his senses to create mood, aroma, stillness and humility. Over 140 paintings, gouache on paper, drawings and sketchbooks, including The Scroll, a 30-foot wall poem, are all on view at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art through January 18, 2021.

Romancing the Surface @ GRIMM, Amsterdam

January 10–March 1, 2021 grimmgallery.com