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Dana Schutz cakes her paintings in thick gobs of gooey paint. This inaugural London exhibition is a messy, exuberant tribute of her medium, but some big messages are subtly embedded if you manage to uncover them.

Schutz's Approach

Her method – which has seen her lauded as a leading painters of her generation – is focused on texture, application, hue and substance. This is art for artists, real high-level art-nerd stuff. If you get your kicks losing yourself in layers of pigment and shadow, there’s plenty to keep you going for a long time. But it’s Schutz’s grotesque, dreamlike, animated, metaphorical imagery that truly drives the artworks resonate.

Works in the First Gallery

The works in the initial room are full of enormous one-eyed beings and roaring mobs. One piece shows a collection of forms trudges mindlessly towards something off canvas, brandishing fists and leaving a trail of trash in their wake. A different work features a figure given a huge mask in some bizarre ceremony in front of a horde of unattractive followers. It’s easy to interpret these as political, as observation on the state of the US, on how society is divided and furious, and mob mentality is turning everything to waste.

The Kiss by Dana Schutz.

Shift in Focus

In the second exhibition area, Schutz seems to shift her focus to the people in power, instead of the crowds that follow them. Shadowy figures stuff their mouths with fruit and meat in a gloomy eating space; a cardinal and a green-clad man sit back in golden chairs – whereas in additional pieces a pair comfort one another in a landscape filled with corpses, and a female figure, maybe Schutz herself, rests unclothed, forlorn and powerless in a bed.

Influences and Allusions

This is ultradense, thickly layered art, covered in allusions. You’ll find the ethereal dream-like signs of Odilon Redon, the pink, corporeal animation of Philip Guston, the festive bizarre elements of a Belgian artist, the big-headed weirdness of Paul McCarthy. There are riffs on the art historical tradition, countless nods to pop culture (It seems certain that one painting is a portrait of a cartoon character from an animated series). It would take time spotting all the elements from classic painters with which she’s sprinkled the works.

The Example by Dana Schutz.

Interpretation and Narratives

Painting this dense, intricate and symbolic invites to analysis. It seems like one is tested on the symbolism of a Renaissance masterpiece but, for my money, there are a couple of distinct narratives: the people in power, and the public that they bait.

The 2017 Scandal

And the artist understands about that. In 2017, her artwork Open Casket – a partly abstract representation of the corpse of Emmett Till, a young African-American who was murdered by two white men in Mississippi in the mid-20th century – caused untold controversy when it was shown at the Whitney Biennial. Critics charged her of exploiting black death for her personal benefit. A protester demonstrated against the painting each day, and some demanded it to be destroyed. A white artist painting – perhaps compassionately – a scene of black pain was the major headline of the biennial. This marked the height of the recent social conflicts, a period that saw people turning on each other even if they were on the same side. In retrospect, in a society increasingly polarized, simplified and angrier than ever, it seems almost charming that individuals found moments to get angry at this heartfelt, sorrowful artwork.

Aftermath and Recent Art

This might have ended her career, and the artist likely aims to progress. But all her subsequent work since exists in its influence. She unavoidably emerged of that ordeal a changed artist. But what hasn’t changed is her exceptional skill, how she still engages in brilliant, sickly, gloopy and deeply political art at the highest level.