Gallery Moos, Toronto (Sold October 1983)
Private Collection, Toronto
Literature
Ihor Holubizky, “Gershon Iskowitz: Life & Work” [online publication], Art Canada Institute, Toronto, 2019, pages 64 and 77
Through the 1960s, the paintings of Gershon Iskowitz moved steadily towards abstraction. Achieving what would be become his mature style around 1967, Iskowitz continued exploring this aesthetic throughout the 1970s with commitment and focus. Always an expert colourist, he employed delicate shifts in hue to create works which buzz and shimmer with a playful energy. Critic Art Perry observed: “An Iskowitz red is dissimilar to any other red. It is a hyper-red, a supersaturating red, an individually and sensually encompassing red... Through a subtle juxtaposition of catalyst colour dots and his mottled colour-fields, Iskowitz not only controls but activates the whole painted surface [to] make it vibrate at a higher intensity: Iskowitz is probably Canada’s finest colour engineer.”
“Deep Red #7” has a strong musical quality with intervals of high-key colour which form a visual rhythm. The mottled red areas float gently across the surface, as in an aerial view of the land through parted clouds. The carefully constructed layering of colours creates an illusion of pictorial depth. In a 1975 interview, Iskowitz explained: “... It’s a whole realistic world. It lives, moves... I see those things... the experience, out in the field, of looking up in the trees or in the sky, of looking down from the height of a helicopter. So what you do is try to make a composition of all those things, make some kind of reality: like the trees should belong to the sky, and the ground should belong to the trees, and the ground should belong to the sky. Everything has to be united.”
