The title of Chris Trueman‘s show, “After(image),” betokens the fleeting vivid impressions his paintings convey. Hovering between abstraction and representation, each of his nine vibrant works currently on view at Edward Cella embodies a wide array of marks, evocations and references. Drippy glowing washes are interspersed with luscious smears, brushy swatches, spray-painted spatters, and sinusoidal erasures within compositions whose calligraphic movement recalls Chinese and Japanese ink painting. In large paintings such as BCS (2019), faint suggestions of landscapes, figures and objects emerge from apparent nonobjectivity, only to quickly recede and then morph into other vestiges of representation, as though a surreal scenario by Roberto Matta were dissolving in a Gerhard Richter abstraction. Trueman paints on Yupo, a nonabsorbent synthetic substrate that allows him to readily wipe, carve and squeegee wet acrylic for unusual effects. It also enhances his palette’s intensity akin to LED screens or flower petals in the sun. The cyan swath in BEO (2019, pictured above) might appear as a waterfall or tattered denim; but it doesn’t matter what one sees, one simply wants to continue gazing.

Edward Cella Art + Architecture
2754 S. La Cienega Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90034
Show runs through May 4