A painting does not
have to be a thing.

We are very good at recognising things. A face, a tree, a line of mountains. Abstract painting asks us to stay a little longer in the moment before recognition.

Begin with what is there.

Look at Fire. Red moves through a charcoal field; a small bright opening holds the eye. It is easy to see flame. But you can also follow the way a soft edge meets a hard one, or how a dark patch makes the red beside it feel warmer. Neither way of looking is more correct. The painting does not change when your reading does.

That freedom can feel awkward at first. We want to know whether we have understood. Try replacing “What is it?” with “Where does my eye go?” It is a smaller question, and one you can actually answer.

A surface, not just an image.

Acrylic can sit in a thin veil or gather into a raised mark. Those differences matter. A photograph gives us the arrangement of colour; a close view lets us notice the interruptions, the drag of a brush, the places where one layer leaves another visible. Texture is the record of something happening.

In Wood, long pale passages pull the eye vertically. In Color Tiles, the eye keeps changing direction. One asks for a slow scan; the other is a conversation you join halfway through. Scale will change the encounter again. Before choosing an original, ask for its measured dimensions rather than estimating from the photograph.

Let the room make an introduction.

A painting need not repeat the colour of a cushion to belong in a room. It can offer a temperature, a rhythm, or a useful interruption. In a very orderly space, a worked and irregular surface can feel generous. Against a busy room, a quieter painting may provide somewhere for the eye to rest.

Start by noticing the light where the painting will hang. Look at the wall in the morning and again in the evening. Think about where you will usually see the work: standing close, passing a doorway, sitting across the room. These are more useful starting points for a commission than a list of fashionable colours.

Leave something unresolved.

The pleasure of living with an abstract painting is that you do not finish looking at it. A passage you barely noticed becomes the part you return to. What looked like water yesterday may simply look like blue today. Nothing has gone wrong. There is still room in the painting for you.