Untitled

By overlapping thin layers of color, Bishop achieves complex geometric arrangements in his works on paper. Unlike his Minimalist contemporaries who employed hard-lined geometric forms, Bishop believes in the development of personal expression and emotion in art. He learned from the various artistic techniques of the twentieth century that surrounded him, but produced works that reflect his own feelings rather than those of his contemporaries. In his own words, Bishop is a “quiet kind of Abstract Expressionist.”(J. Bishop, “Paintings on Paper,” Richter Verlag, New York, 2007). His work embodies the sensitivity and harmony of Lyrical Abstraction, a trend that counteracts the hard-edge style of Minimalism.

Smaller works on paper, such as the present examples, were the artist’s focus during the last three decades of his career. These works exemplify the simplistic yet powerful manner in which Bishop paints. The juxtaposition of large white spaces with concentrated blocks of color speaks to the artist’s skillfulness in depicting layers of dimensionality in his work. Bishop incorporates intersecting horizontal and vertical lines in a manner that reinforces the viewer’s ability to perceive scale and space.