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The American painter cakes her paintings in heavy layers of gooey paint. Her first proper London exhibition is a splodgy, orgiastic tribute of her medium, but some big messages are subtly embedded if you manage to uncover them.

Schutz's Approach

Schutz’s approach – which has seen her lauded as a leading figurative artists of her generation – is all about texture, application, hue and substance. It’s painting for painters, truly advanced aesthetic geekery. If you get your kicks losing yourself in coats of color and shading, there’s plenty to engage you for a while. But it’s her bizarre, dreamlike, animated, symbolic visuals that really makes the paintings tick.

Works in the First Gallery

These pieces in the first gallery are populated by giant-headed cyclopses and baying crowds. One piece shows a group of figures trudges mindlessly toward an event off canvas, brandishing fists and leaving a trail of trash in their path. In another presents a person receiving a huge mask in an odd initiation ritual in front of a crowd of ugly supporters. It’s not hard to interpret these as social commentary, as observation on America’s condition, on societal splits and angry, and crowd psychology is transforming all to rubbish.

The Kiss by the artist.

Changing Themes

In the other gallery space, the artist appears to shift her focus to the people in power, rather than the crowds that follow them. Shadowy figures fill their faces with grapes and steak in a gloomy eating space; a cardinal and a green-clad man sit back in golden chairs – while in additional pieces a pair comfort one another in a scene filled with dead bodies, and a woman, maybe Schutz herself, lies naked, desolate and powerless in a bed.

Inspirations and References

This is ultradense, thickly layered art, filled with allusions. You’ll find the ethereal dream-like signs of Odilon Redon, the fleshy pink cartoonishness of an American painter, the carnival grotesqueries of a Belgian artist, the large-headed oddities of Paul McCarthy. There are riffs on the art historical tradition, numerous references to mainstream media (It seems certain that a particular work is a portrait of Handsome Squidward from an animated series). It would take time identifying all the bits of Cézanne and David with which she’s littered the works.

The Example by Dana Schutz.

Interpretation and Narratives

Painting this dense, intricate and symbolic invites to interpretation. It seems like I’m being quizzed on the symbolism of a Titian but, for my money, there are a couple of distinct narratives: the people in power, and the crowds that they provoke.

Controversy and Impact

And Schutz should know about that. Back in 2017, her artwork a titled piece – a semi-abstracted depiction of the corpse of a historical figure, a young African-American who was murdered by two white men in a southern state in 1955 – sparked immense debate when it was displayed at the a New York exhibition. She was accused of exploiting black death for her own gain. A protester demonstrated against the painting each day, and some demanded it to be removed. A white artist painting – arguably with great sympathy – a scene of black pain was the major headline of the event. It was the peak of the late 2010s social conflicts, a period that saw people turning on each other even if they were on the same side. In retrospect, in a world more divided, simplified and angrier than ever, it feels almost quaint that individuals found moments to get upset at this heartfelt, sorrowful painting.

Legacy and Current Work

It could have ruined her professional life, and the artist likely aims to progress. But all her subsequent work since exists in its influence. She unavoidably came out of that experience a changed artist. But what remains constant is how good she is, how she still engages in masterful, unsettling, gloopy and deeply political painting at the highest level.