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Dana Schutz smothers her paintings in thick gobs of viscous pigment. This inaugural London exhibition is a messy, exuberant tribute of her medium, but significant themes are subtly embedded if you can scratch your way towards them.

Schutz's Approach

Her method – earning her acclaim as one of the most important painters of her generation – is all about texture, application, hue and substance. It’s painting for painters, truly advanced art-nerd stuff. Should you enjoy immersing yourself in coats of color and shadow, there’s enough here to engage you for a long time. But it’s Schutz’s grotesque, surreal, cartoony, metaphorical imagery that truly drives the artworks resonate.

Initial Exhibition Pieces

These pieces in the first gallery are populated by enormous one-eyed beings and baying crowds. One piece shows a collection of forms stomps senselessly toward an event off canvas, brandishing fists and creating a path of trash in their path. A different work features a person receiving a large disguise in an odd initiation ritual before a crowd of ugly supporters. It’s easy to read any of this as social commentary, as commentary on the state of the US, on societal splits and furious, and mob mentality is turning everything to rubbish.

An Embrace by the artist.

Shift in Focus

In the second exhibition area, Schutz seems to redirect attention to the leaders and elites, instead of the masses that support them. Mysterious forms stuff their mouths with grapes and steak in a gloomy eating space; a religious figure and a man in green sit back in gilded seats – whereas in other works a pair comfort one another in a scene filled with corpses, and a woman, perhaps the artist, rests unclothed, desolate and helpless in bed.

Inspirations and References

This is ultradense, thickly layered art, covered in references. There’s the ethereal dream-like signs of Odilon Redon, the pink, corporeal animation of an American painter, the festive bizarre elements of James Ensor, the large-headed oddities of a contemporary artist. There are riffs on the art historical tradition, numerous references to pop culture (It seems certain that a particular work is a depiction of a cartoon character from SpongeBob SquarePants). It would take time identifying all the bits of Cézanne and David with which she’s littered the works.

A Model by Dana Schutz.

Meaning and Stories

Art this complex, complex and allegorical invites to interpretation. I feel as if one is tested on the symbolism of a Titian but, in my view, there are two relatively clear narratives: the people in power, and the crowds that they provoke.

The 2017 Scandal

And Schutz should know about such dynamics. In 2017, her artwork Open Casket – a partly abstract representation of the body of a historical figure, a black teenager who was murdered by racist perpetrators in a southern state in 1955 – sparked immense debate when it was shown at the a New York exhibition. Critics charged her of exploiting black death for her personal benefit. An activist picketed the work daily, and others called for it to be destroyed. An artist of European descent depicting – perhaps compassionately – a image of black pain was the major headline of the biennial. It was the peak of the recent social conflicts, a time that featured infighting even if they were on the identical team. Looking back now, in a world increasingly polarized, less nuanced and angrier than ever, it seems almost charming that individuals found moments to get angry at this emotional, mournful artwork.

Legacy and Current Work

This might have ended her career, and the artist likely aims to progress. But everything she’s done now exists in its influence. She unavoidably emerged of that ordeal a changed artist. But what hasn’t changed is her exceptional skill, how she still engages in brilliant, sickly, thick and highly topical painting at the highest level.