Red Rose Cantata

Clusters of short red and white strokes fill the canvas edge to edge, each small rectangle set close to the next so the surface seems to vibrate with color. There is no horizon or figure, only the rhythm of these packed marks spreading across the whole picture plane. The piece, titled Red Rose Cantata, was made in 1973 using acrylic paint and is held at the National Gallery of Art, where it came to the collection as a gift from Vincent Melzac. Alma Thomas (1891–1978), an American artist, worked within the Color Field and Washington Color School movements, building her abstract compositions from repeated patches of pigment. Looking closely, the red and white strokes never blend into solid fields, so the whole canvas keeps a shimmering, mosaic-like texture.