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Dana Schutz smothers her paintings in heavy layers of viscous pigment. This first proper London exhibition is a splodgy, orgiastic celebration of her medium, but significant themes are subtly embedded if you manage to uncover them.

Schutz's Approach

Her method – which has seen her lauded as one of the most important painters of her generation – is focused on texture, application, colour and materiality. It’s painting for painters, real high-level aesthetic geekery. If you get your kicks immersing yourself in layers of pigment and shading, there’s enough here to engage you for a while. But it’s Schutz’s grotesque, surreal, cartoony, symbolic visuals that truly drives the paintings tick.

Initial Exhibition Pieces

These pieces in the first gallery are populated by giant-headed cyclopses and roaring mobs. One piece depicts a group of figures trudges mindlessly toward an event off canvas, brandishing fists and leaving a trail of trash in their wake. In another presents a figure given a huge mask in some bizarre initiation ritual before a crowd of unattractive followers. It’s easy to read any of this as political, as commentary on the state of the US, on how society is divided and furious, and mob mentality is turning everything to rubbish.

The Kiss by Dana Schutz.

Shift in Focus

In the second exhibition area, Schutz seems to redirect attention to the leaders and elites, rather than the masses that support them. Mysterious forms fill their faces with fruit and meat in a gloomy eating space; a religious figure and a man in green sit back in gilded seats – whereas in other works a pair console each other in a scene filled with dead bodies, and a woman, perhaps the artist, lies naked, desolate and helpless in a bed.

Inspirations and References

This is ultradense, thickly layered art, filled with references. You’ll find the ethereal dream-like signs of Odilon Redon, the pink, corporeal animation of an American painter, the carnival grotesqueries of James Ensor, the big-headed weirdness of a contemporary artist. She includes nods on the history of painting, numerous references to pop culture (It seems certain that a particular work is a depiction of a cartoon character from an animated series). It would take time spotting all the elements from classic painters with which she’s sprinkled the artworks.

The Example by the exhibitor.

Meaning and Stories

Painting this dense, intricate and symbolic leaves itself open to interpretation. It seems like one is tested on the symbolism of a Renaissance masterpiece but, for my money, there are a couple of distinct narratives: the ruling class, and the crowds that they bait.

The 2017 Scandal

And Schutz should know about that. Back in 2017, her painting a titled piece – a partly abstract representation of the corpse of Emmett Till, a young African-American who was lynched by two white men in a southern state in 1955 – caused untold controversy when it was displayed at the Whitney Biennial. Critics charged her of profiting from tragedy for her personal benefit. A protester picketed the work daily, and others called for it to be destroyed. An artist of European descent depicting – 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. Looking back now, in a society increasingly polarized, simplified and angrier than ever, it seems almost charming that individuals found moments to get upset at this heartfelt, sorrowful painting.

Aftermath and Recent Art

This might have ended her career, and the artist likely aims to progress. But everything she’s done now exists in its influence. She inevitably emerged of that ordeal a transformed creator. But what remains constant is how good she is, how she continues to practice in brilliant, sickly, gloopy and deeply political art at the top tier.