Mass Plane Black, One in the Series, 1976-1977, 1976

Private Collection, Toronto Private Collection, Vancouver Sotheby’s, auction, Toronto, 23 November 2010, lot 138 as "Mass Plane Black, One in the Series", 1976-1977 Estate of Robert Noakes

Walter Klepac, "Ron Martin, To Foil Oils Phase III and IV", Toronto, 1999, unpaginated

Born and raised in London, Ontario, Ron Martin has been associated with the London Regionalism group of artists, which included Greg Curnoe, Jack Chambers and Paterson Ewen. Influenced by Curnoe’s interest in Marcel Duchamp and Kurt Schwitters, Martin developed a strategic and conceptual approach to abstract painting. Ron Martin paints in series, exhausting his objective before moving on to the next. In his artist statement, Martin remarks: “the idea of realising in a group of serial abstract paintings a multiplicity of mental perspectives rooted to the specification of the medium through its relation to colour, material, and sensation provides viewers with the means to appreciate a rich and inexhaustible mother load of perception.” In 1974, Martin began painting black paintings, a colour that he focused on until 1981. The gestural paintings shared a consistent and pre-defined method of working. Martin would constrain himself to a specific size of canvas, a specific amount of black paint and a fixed amount of time to make each black painting.