Artwork Appreciation
Pan Hsien-Jen is skilled at using geometrical forms and simple colors to create paintings with complex visual effects. His Diagonal uses a single diagonal line stretching between opposite corners of the painting as a focus and to divide the composition into two halves, each with complex repeating geometrical patterns. The gradations of black, grey, and white make the yellow diagonal line seem to scintillate even more, and the flat, two-dimensional space also seems to become three-dimensional. To ensure greater clarity of the geometrical pattern, Pan used tape to limit the shape of the brushstrokes. Inside or outside of the tape range, the brush can run freely, or the paint dry-brushed on, or dripped on, or layered on, and the borders can be clear or fuzzy. For him, tape is an extension of the imagination. It supports the modeling but also liberates it, creating more possibilities.