Instead, I started a new work with canvas which quickly went well. I told myself that I would put the paper and water-based paints away to avoid further “sunken time,” consoling myself with the knowledge that they had acted to reset and restart my painting practice. Each day that I returned to the studio, I returned to the stack of paper, pulling out one with the intent of making only a few marks to warm up. Hours would pass along with another sheet of paper and another tube of paint.  I waited for whatever this project was to reveal itself.

On a run after the first snow of the year I looked down into a pile of ice broken up by salt and mud. The marks and shapes appeared like a grim winter version of the pigment pools I’d been setting down in the studio. This sidewalk composition lacked the authorship that I had been working to imprint and called back the ease I saw in the Richters. I suddenly knew where I was heading.  This experience acted almost as a grounding synapse, one that had propelled so many paintings before and allowed me to break free of whatever rigor came before. I let the paper buckle and dictate where the paint flowed. I embraced the underpainting revealed with each erasure and revision.

While I continued to make the canvas works that I had returned to with fresh insights, I found I could not fully put away these new works on paper.  I was determined that they should find their way.  Much like when a canvas is complete and stretched, a painting will reveal itself. By removing these watercolors from the chaos of the drawing table, I could see these works for what they were.  Held aloft from the madness, they revealed an energy all their own.  Memories of the ocean, nature trails, and winter light were all embedded in these modest slips of paper. 

-Ryan Wallace

RYAN WALLACE’s (b. 1977) mixed media paintings conjure an ethereal space between the material and intangible. Repurposing fragments from earlier and developing pieces, the artist seams, layers, excavates, and manipulates the surface of his work to incorporate a wealth of textures and techniques. By limiting his resources, Wallace has developed a rich process-based practice whereby each body of work leads to the next in terms of materials and composition. Wallace’s work has been exhibited at Marjorie Barrick Museum, Las Vegas (2018); and University of the Arts, Philadelphia (2016); and BAM, Brooklyn (2011). Recent group exhibitions include Volery Gallery, Dubai, United Arab Emirates (2022); Bohemian’s Gallery, Natsume Books, Tokyo, Japan (2022); De Boer Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (2021); and The Bunker Artspace, West Palm Beach, FL (2019). His work can be found in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, NYC; Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco; Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego; and the Schwartz Collection at Harvard Business School, Cambridge, among others.  Wallace will have a full gallery exhibition opening June 2026.