Something happened when you saw this. What was it?
Abstract Inquiry · 2024
Ontological Inquiry
Available · in the studio, Phoenix
The question that asks itself — what is the nature of what is, painted by someone who has been sitting with it a long time.
Ontological Inquiry (2024) is a visual question — a philosophical gesture rendered in form, color, and spatial uncertainty. This 48 x 48 inch acrylic painting from the Playful Abstraction collection explores the tension between presence and perception, between structure and suggestion.
The composition is dominated by interwoven rectangles — some sharply defined, others softened by translucent overlays. A field of pale ivory acts as stage, while blocks of muted red, soft black, and golden beige shift positions like thoughts in motion. Negative space becomes as meaningful as shape.
I painted Ontological Inquiry during a period of deep reading — Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, ancient Vedic texts. But this painting isn’t academic. It’s intuitive. It is inquiry by touch, by mark, by pause.
Where to see it. In person at RituStudio, Phoenix, by appointment. Represented by Jarrow & Goodman, Los Angeles.
The space it needs
- Wall
- At least 5 ft wide
- Ceiling
- 8 ft or more
- Light
- Natural light preferred — oil layers shift through the day
- Daylight
- Teal and charcoal keep it largely stable as the light changes, with the muted red warming only slightly late in the day. Moderate daylight suits it; full glare would thin the negative space.
Lives best in
Living room 5/5
Ontological Inquiry earns a 5 in the living room because its 4×4 ft square holds the wall without dominating it, and the charcoal-teal-muted red conversation rewards the kind of sustained, unhurried looking that only a living room reliably offers.
Hotel lobby 4/5
The muted palette and gestural touch-marks read legibly from a distance across a lobby, and the restless energy gives transient viewers something that moves without requiring them to stay, making this a strong 4 in a lobby with natural sidelighting.
Details
- Size
- 4 × 4 ft (W × H)
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Year
- 2024
- Collection
- Abstract Inquiry
- Palette
- Charcoal Gray · Teal · Muted Red · Earth Tone · Muted White
- Weight
- About 22 lb
- Ready
- In the studio; delivery 8–12 weeks
Its ArtGram
ArtGram.Fork
- Texture3
- Form3
- Colour range3
- Palette3.2
- Contrast3.5
- Abstraction Quotient2
