The American expressionist,
Stuart Shils, whom I greatly respect, delivered a gallery talk on Thursday the 8th, and must have spent fifteen minutes devoted to focusing upon this painting. He was drawn to the relationships of the figurative elements as they were designed in the space, and was especially intrigued by the blue sneaker coming in at the top right, a necessary element, as he put it, and he then emphasized the interesting role the shadows produced by this shoe and the legs added to the composition and infered narrative. He talked about the qualities of the edges thoughout the painting, the alliteration of arch design motifs repeating, the design of the feet pointing up into the head, and the interest of some negative spaces. As he delved into the underlying psychology of this painting, I had to smile, because he went much deeper in his interpretation as the viewer experiencing this painting, than I ever thought about as the creating artist! It is always interesting to hear what take another has on one's own work. It can be an insightful education. At any rate, one of his main points was to illustrate with this painting how photography has opened up very innovative new ways of seeing the world from pre-existing western compositional conventions; and that this particular composition with its particular croppings of the figurative elements with the mother's legs coming in front of the boy, would never have occured to an artist until recent times. I am paraphrasing Mr. Shils here, as he actually said quite a lot. I enjoyed his in depth talk. As he finished up his last sentence, he began a hurried run out the door to catch an express train to New York.
Garth