“I want the [Waterfall] paintings to express something in the will of nature. It’s a spiritual quest.”
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A testament to the forces of nature and gravity, Pat Steir’s Painted with the Chinese in Mind encapsulates an abstracted landscape which spans over seven feet. Executed in 1986, the present work is an exemplary painting from her iconic Waterfall series, in which Steir insightfully captures the dynamism of the paint’s subjugation to chance. Painted with the Chinese in Mind makes reference to the artist’s careful study of Chinese landscape painting, which found its impetus in Steir’s affinity for Eastern spiritual and philosophical traditions. Drawing upon this influence, Steir sees painting as a kind of meditation—one that is captured in motion.
In her Waterfall series, Steir sacrifices control and embraces fluidity. Standing atop a ladder on her studio floor, Steir pours and flings paint onto an unstretched canvas pinned to the wall, allowing the oversaturated paint to then slowly cascade down the length of the canvas. Through this method, Steir leaves the artwork’s appearance to chance: she cannot control where the paint will land nor how it will drip to the floor. As the artist has said, “the paint itself makes the picture...Gravity makes the image.”
“My idea was not to touch the canvas, not to paint, but to pour the paint and let the paint itself make a picture. I set the limitations. The limitations, of course, are the color, the size, the wind in the room, and how I put the paint on. And then everything outside of me controls how that paint falls. It’s a joy to let the painting make itself. It takes away all kinds of responsibility.”
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Steir studied at the Pratt Institute as well as Boston University College of Fine Arts, after which she began painting in New York. She rose to prominence there in the 1970s, following the focus on Abstract Expressionism and during the height of Minimalism. Steir befriended fellow artists including John Cage, Sol LeWitt, and Agnes Martin, who each influenced her desire to explore concepts such as chance, erasure, and structure in her oeuvre. Her early works held resemblance to Jackson Pollock’s drip paintings, yet her approach was entirely novel. Beginning her first Waterfall paintings in 1990, Steir’s process was much less about her own interaction with the paint, but instead about leaving it up to nature—in effect, her painterly hand was removed from the finished painting entirely.
Waterfall Paintings in Esteemed Museum Collections
The paintings not only resemble and remind one of a waterfall, but fully embody the dynamic motion of a natural waterfall itself. Fluidity is preserved on the canvas, a tribute to gravity while remaining frozen in the absence of its continued effects. This tension—between chance and control, movement and stasis—transfixes the viewer, affirming Steir’s artistic expertise. Painted with the Chinese in Mind is a breathtaking example of Steir’s most renowned series of paintings, resting in balance while evoking the movement of rushing falls.
Studio Visit with Pat Steir: A Great Woman Artist