Day and Night

Label TextRather than hanging on the wall, Nelson’s large two-sided painting rests in a steel stand that allows the viewer to circle the work and see both sides of the canvas. While they work on only one side of the canvas at a time, their process inevitably affects the other. Nelson covered one side of this canvas with ropes of cheesecloth soaked in thinned acrylic paint. The canvas absorbed the red, orange, and green paint, which appear as stains of color on the reverse. They then covered the same side with a blue tint that barely seeps through the cloth. Just as there is no night without day, each side of the work is the inverse of its pair. The artist has explained, "The sides of the paintings are often very different from each other, and that interests me—the way in which two very different visual and physical manifestations can be inseparable from, and, indeed, create each other."
Exhibition HistoryPhiladelphia, Locks Gallery, Dona Nelson: Selected Paintings 2019 - 2023, April 5 - May 11, 2024.
Published ReferencesMyers, Terry R. Dona Nelson: Take All Sides, 2024 Locks Art Publications, Philadelphia, illus. pp. 26-27.

DimensionsOverall: 106 × 88 × 3 in. (269.2 × 223.5 × 7.6 cm)

Accession Number 2024.21

Classificationspainting

SignedDONA Nelson (verso l,l, black marker)

InscriptionsDAY AND NIGHT 2023 (verso l,l, black marker)

ProvenanceArtist; (Locks Gallery); Des Moines Art Center [purchased from previous, 2024]