From the top: Codex Major 1, Codex Major 2, Codex Major 4, and Codex Major 7, 2012. All acrylic on panel, 48" x 38."My old professor and dear friend George Hofmann has recently hit upon a group of paintings that I'm especially fond of - the Codex Major series. The removal of the paint is perhaps more important than the application in this group. The barely-there smears of high-key colors give the pictures a lightness - both in the sense of weight and illumination - and transforms the plywood ground into a hazy yellowish atmosphere, even as the hardness and physicality of the wood tries to reassert itself.
And I think the thing I like best is the speed at which they seem to be moving - particularly in Codex Major #1 and #2. This, to me, is a fresh take on deKooning's famous "glimpse" of something captured while in motion, caught in one's peripheral vision.
