Clement Greenberg championed the notion that modernist painting must adhere to the “purity” in medium, depict only the non-figurative, and be void of references to the political. Greenberg’s paradigm dismisses the ability for the visual arts to critically assess the society in which it exists and triumphs an agenda that preserves painting as a medium. Rather than abiding by a limiting modernist aesthetic as outlined by Greenberg, Mark Bradford instead reappropriates this abstract modernist aesthetic to symbolize an urban abstraction that occurs in the environments of Los Angeles. Track U Down Like A Lojack (2004), a new painting by Mark Bradford, is a result of a painterly execution of mixed media with minimal use of paint. Bradford’s many canvases appear at first to reference modernist abstractions in the tradition of a patterned Agnes Martin but upon further inspection, the work usurps traditional abstraction by embedding in them nuances from the diverse landscape of South Los Angeles. This work arrives in tandem with other forms of media that decentralize and reposition painting. Bradford’s collage technique makes use of materials indigenous to urban spaces and his experiences –hair-end papers, gesso, and found object elements such as newspaper and advertisement scraps—all the while making bold references to pop and commercial culture with precise titles. Bradford’s paintings allows us to participate in the negotiations with the histories that precede Bradford’s work and to engage in the dialogues that occur within our own cities.

***

Born in 1961 in Los Angeles, Mark Bradford received his MFA and BFA from the California Institute of the Arts. Bradford lives in Los Angeles and has exhibited his work in solo exhibitions including Pomona College Museum of Art, Claremont, California; Patricia Faure Gallery, Santa Monica; Lombard-Freid Fine Arts, New York; and the Luggage Store Gallery, San Francisco. His work has also been featured in group exhibitions at such venues as ARCO 2003, Madrid; UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Contemporary Arts Museum, Houstin; The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; and Greene Naftali, New York.