Stanley Whitney has experimented for decades with a single compositional strategy rendering grids with seemingly inexhaustible variations of color. He has described his process as similar to the call and response flow of traditional African-American music, with one color calling forth another and dictating the structure of the work. Whitney draws inspiration from a wide range of historical and cultural references including Roman architecture, American quilt making, and jazz.

At Two Palms, Whitney has embraced etching, silkscreen, and monotype printing as new means of experimenting with color and space. These mediums allow the artist to lay down colors at a rapid pace, responding to one color with another, and building his signature grid. When making monotypes, Whitney works with watercolor and chunky crayons, applying pigment directly on a wood plate. In the press, under 400 tons of flat, vertical pressure, the pigment is transferred to a thick watercolor paper while the wood grain of the plate embosses the paper, leaving behind a ghostly pattern that adds to the richness of these works.

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Image: Stanley Whitney, Untitled, 2020