From the artist's statement:
I painted them as history paintings, the killing of Osama Bin Laden. That moment, that one second, in American history. One is of Obama. Another is of Angela Merkel; another one of George Bush, but they don’t look like them at all; another one is of a ‘Z’ that looks like a bit of a barn door. One day I’m in the studio looking at them thinking, you’re absolutely kidding me. This just looks like a bunch of balloons going across a field. When I was painting them I was thinking of Rembrandt and Franz Hals, and the paintings have got nothing in them of Rembrandt or Hals. I’d finished with the painting of the horse. I’m looking at the seven paintings thinking I like them but they’re all rubbish, because I’ve set out to make this vast history painting suite and it just looks like anxiety, and a horse. Anxiety and the horse. That’s exactly what they are. That’s all right. Then the paintings could live.
Gary Hume: Anxiety and the Horse
Through June 23, 2012
Matthew Marks Gallery
523 W 24th Street
New York, NY 10001
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