Polly Lanning Sparrow

Region: West

The investigation of dichotomies and contradictory visual relationships drives my work, specifically, perfection versus imperfection, which often manifests itself as the tension between flat, clean-edged geometry and the organic irregularities of plywood and paper. Essential to this inquiry is a deep commitment to reductive imagery, the play between the calculated and the intuited, color and its absence, and grid-based systems. Also integral to my thinking is the concept of fragmentation, or broken links in communication, which I have addressed via groups of painted panels that may be reconfigured for alternate meanings and experiences. Seeking a new kind of painting remains vital to me—a painting, with its rhythms and disruptions, that brings the viewer immediately and fully into the act of seeing and contemplating.