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Painting representation fails. The plainness of Churchman's depiction is a respect to the source material, a non-compete clause showing deference to the object it can't fully contain or conjure. A fish swims, it shouldn't be the wild fanciful object of some painter's heinous desire. Showing it some respect by leaving it well enough alone, plainness acknowledging the representation that can't do justice to it. Painting treatments like massage to soften the body presented. Like any of Paul Thek's paintings of the Earth hovering over black unarchival void, the distance is homage. PR:"we are so afraid of the brilliance coming at us, and the sharp experience of our life, that we can’t even focus our eyes."
See too: Trevor Shimizu at 47 Canal