Atmosphere

Baert Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

February 24 - March 30, 2024

In this new series of works, the artist refers to a text by Gilles Deleuze in which he references Paul Cézanne’s belief that “the painter must look beyond a landscape to its chaos ... to the point where one no longer sees forms or even matter, but only forces, densities, intensities.” It is from this principle that Braathen’s new body of work departs, reaching for an embodiment of the manifold definitions of atmosphere.

Most of the paintings in Atmosphere are large scale, their vastness an invitation to enter the psychic wilderness with our whole body and experience the sources of heat, movement, textures, and force of Braathen’s space. She builds up the surface of her paintings with variegated gestural marks that bring out the recognisable qualities of the subject while alerting the viewer to the environment’s protean forces. As such, both the painting process and the final work is transient, often feeling like it’s about to break open, change, or begin to vibrate or radiate in unforeseen ways.

All work © Melinda Braathen