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Dana Schutz cakes her canvases in thick gobs of gooey paint. This inaugural London exhibition is a splodgy, orgiastic tribute of her material, but some big messages are subtly embedded if you can scratch your way towards them.

The Artist's Technique

Her method – which has seen her lauded as one of the most important painters of her generation – is focused on texture, application, colour and materiality. It’s painting for painters, truly advanced aesthetic geekery. If you get your kicks losing yourself in coats of color and shading, there’s enough here to keep you going for a long time. But it’s her bizarre, surreal, cartoony, metaphorical imagery that really makes the paintings tick.

Works in the First Gallery

These pieces in the initial room are populated by giant-headed cyclopses and roaring mobs. In one shows a group of figures stomps senselessly toward an event outside the frame, brandishing fists and creating a path of debris in their wake. A different work presents a person given a large disguise in some bizarre initiation ritual before a crowd of ugly supporters. It’s not hard to interpret these as political, as commentary on America’s condition, on how society is divided and furious, and crowd psychology is turning everything to waste.

An Embrace by Dana Schutz.

Shift in Focus

In the other gallery space, the artist appears to shift her focus to the people in power, rather than the crowds that follow them. Mysterious forms stuff their mouths with grapes and steak in a gloomy eating space; a cardinal and a man in green sit back in golden chairs – while in additional pieces a pair comfort one another in a landscape strewn with dead bodies, and a female figure, perhaps the artist, lies unclothed, forlorn and helpless in bed.

Inspirations and References

This is ultradense, thickly layered art, filled with references. You’ll find the dreamy surreal symbolism of Odilon Redon, the pink, corporeal animation of Philip Guston, the festive bizarre elements of James Ensor, the big-headed weirdness of a contemporary artist. She includes nods on the history of painting, countless nods to pop culture (I am almost 100% sure that one painting is a depiction of Handsome Squidward from an animated series). It would take time spotting all the elements from classic painters with which she’s sprinkled the artworks.

The Example by Dana Schutz.

Interpretation and Narratives

Painting this dense, intricate and symbolic leaves itself open to analysis. I feel as if one is tested on the symbolism of a Renaissance masterpiece but, in my view, there are two relatively clear themes: the ruling class, and the crowds that they provoke.

The 2017 Scandal

And the artist understands about such dynamics. Back in 2017, her artwork Open Casket – a partly abstract representation of the body of a historical figure, a young African-American who was lynched by two white men in Mississippi in 1955 – sparked immense debate when it was shown at the a New York exhibition. Critics charged her of exploiting black death for her personal benefit. A protester picketed the painting daily, and some called for it to be removed. An artist of European descent painting – perhaps compassionately – a scene of black pain was the biggest story of the biennial. It was the peak of the recent culture wars, a time that saw people turning on each other even if they were on the identical team. In retrospect, in a society increasingly polarized, less nuanced and angrier than ever, it feels almost quaint that people had the time to get angry at this heartfelt, sorrowful artwork.

Legacy and Current Work

This might have ended her career, and Schutz probably wants to progress. But everything she’s done now exists in its influence. She unavoidably emerged of that experience a transformed creator. But what hasn’t changed is her exceptional skill, how she still engages in brilliant, sickly, thick and highly topical art at the highest level.