McArthur Binion (b. 1946, Macon, MS; lives and works in Chicago, IL) combines collage, drawing, and painting to create autobiographical abstractions of painted minimalist patterns over an “under surface” of personal documents and photographs. From photocopies of his birth certificate and pages from his address book to pictures from his childhood and found photographs of lynchings, the poignant and charged images that constitute the tiled base of his work are concealed and abstracted by grids of oil stick. The complexly layered works, from a distance, appear to be monochromatic minimalist abstractions that have led many to compare his work to that of Jasper Johns, Robert Ryman, or Brice Marden. However, while his contemporaries focused more on materiality, abstraction, and in some cases the social and political climate of the time, Binion’s works are intensely personal and deeply dedicated to the rigorous process of making a painting. Upon closer inspection, these monochromatic abstractions come into focus: the perfect grid becomes a series of imperfect laboriously hand-drawn lines, behind which emerge intimate details of Binion’s identity and personal history. Binion’s gridded compositions impose rational order to the layers of personal history, allowing only fragments of information from his birth certificate to be read, or details of his mother’s face to be identified—but never enough to be immediately legible. Having begun his career as a writer, Binion is highly influenced by language and music, as can be seen in his titles and the ways in which he layers information to be “read” rather than simply seen. The tension that exists between the grid and the artist’s visible gestures is not unlike that of jazz music, which merges improvisation with the order of a musical composition.
麥克阿瑟·比尼恩(1946年生於梅肯,先於芝加哥工作及定居)將拼貼、繪畫及油畫相結合,在其個人文件和照片上繪畫極簡主義的圖案,以創作自傳式的抽象藝術品。從他的出生證書副本及電話簿內頁,到他的童年照及有關私刑的照片,這些令人觸動的影像被藏在抽象的油彩方格下,構成了他作品的底子。這種覆雜而深刻的創作過程使他的藝術創作獨樹一幟。從遠處看,這些覆雜的層疊作品就像賈思培·瓊斯、羅伯特·瑞曼或布賴斯·馬登的單色極簡抽象畫作。然而,比起同期藝術家所留意的實質性、抽象化、甚至社會與政治氣候,比尼恩的作品非常貼近他的個人生活,並且十分嚴謹。仔細檢視下,這些單色的抽象方格其實是不完美的手繪線條,讓人近距離的感受比尼恩的身份和經歷。比尼恩的方格構圖為層層的個人歷史加上理性秩序,令觀眾只能看到他的出生證書和母親容貌的一少部分。作為一個作家,比尼恩深受語言和音樂的影響,而我們亦可以由他的作品題目和他重疊資訊的方式領會到這個特質。跟爵士樂中即興與編曲的比重大同小異,比尼恩畫布上的方格和他繪畫的手法也充滿了張力。