Secret Thoughts (Black)

The conventions of representational painting treat a painting's surface as a window through which the viewer gazes into a depicted scene.  In the twentieth century some artists have relegated depiction and narrative to other art forms, and embraced those aspects of painting that are unique to painting: paint, surface, shape, line and color. In this case, the artist has completely done away with any pretense of gazing into another space. In fact, this painting has appendages which, no longer content to remain on the surface of the painting, begin to fly off into our space.