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The American painter smothers her paintings in heavy layers of gooey paint. Her first proper London exhibition is a splodgy, orgiastic celebration of her material, but significant themes are subtly embedded if you manage to uncover them.

Schutz's Approach

Schutz’s approach – which has seen her lauded as one of the most important painters of her generation – is focused on surface, brush strokes, hue and substance. This is art for artists, truly advanced art-nerd stuff. Should you enjoy immersing yourself in layers of pigment and shading, there’s enough here to keep you going for a long time. But it’s her bizarre, dreamlike, animated, metaphorical imagery that truly drives the artworks resonate.

Initial Exhibition Pieces

The works in the first gallery are populated by giant-headed cyclopses and roaring mobs. One piece depicts a collection of forms trudges mindlessly towards something off canvas, brandishing fists and creating a path of debris in their wake. In another features a figure receiving a large disguise in some bizarre initiation ritual before a horde of ugly supporters. It’s easy to interpret these as social commentary, as observation on America’s condition, on societal splits and angry, and mob mentality is turning everything to waste.

An Embrace by Dana Schutz.

Shift in Focus

In the other gallery space, Schutz seems to redirect attention to the people in power, instead of the masses that follow them. Mysterious forms stuff their mouths with fruit and meat in a sombre dining room; a cardinal and a green-clad man sit back in gilded seats – while in additional pieces a couple console each other in a scene strewn with corpses, and a female figure, perhaps the artist, lies unclothed, desolate and powerless in a bed.

Inspirations and References

This is extremely complex, multi-layered art, covered in references. You’ll find the ethereal dream-like signs of Odilon Redon, the fleshy pink cartoonishness of an American painter, the festive bizarre elements of James Ensor, the large-headed oddities of Paul McCarthy. She includes nods on the art historical tradition, countless nods to mainstream media (It seems certain that one painting is a portrait of Handsome Squidward from an animated series). You could spend hours spotting all the elements from classic painters with which she’s littered the artworks.

A Model by the exhibitor.

Interpretation and Narratives

Art this complex, complex and allegorical invites to interpretation. I feel as if one is tested on the meaning of a Titian but, for my money, there are a couple of distinct narratives: the people in power, and the public that they bait.

The 2017 Scandal

And the artist understands about such dynamics. Back in 2017, her painting Open Casket – a semi-abstracted depiction of the body of Emmett Till, a young African-American who was lynched by two white men in a southern state in the mid-20th century – caused untold controversy when it was shown at the a New York exhibition. Critics charged her of exploiting black death for her own gain. A protester demonstrated against the painting daily, and others called for it to be destroyed. A white artist depicting – arguably with great sympathy – a image of African-American suffering was the major headline of the biennial. This marked the height of the recent culture wars, a time that featured infighting even if they were on the identical team. Looking back now, in a world increasingly polarized, less nuanced and more hostile than ever, it feels almost quaint that individuals found moments to get upset at this heartfelt, sorrowful artwork.

Aftermath and Recent Art

This might have ended her career, and Schutz probably wants to move on. But everything she’s done now exists in its influence. She inevitably emerged of that ordeal a changed artist. But what remains constant is her exceptional skill, how she continues to practice in brilliant, sickly, thick and highly topical painting at the top tier.