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The American painter smothers her canvases in thick gobs of gooey paint. Her inaugural London exhibition is a messy, exuberant tribute of her medium, but some big messages are smuggled through if you can scratch your way towards them.

The Artist's Technique

Her method – which has seen her lauded as one of the most important painters of her era – is focused on texture, application, colour and materiality. This is art for artists, truly advanced art-nerd stuff. Should you enjoy losing yourself in layers of pigment and shadow, there’s plenty to keep you going for a while. But it’s Schutz’s grotesque, surreal, cartoony, 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 baying crowds. One piece depicts a collection of forms trudges mindlessly towards something outside the frame, waving hands and creating a path of trash in their path. A different work presents a person receiving a large disguise in an odd ceremony in front of a horde of unattractive followers. It’s not hard to interpret these as political, as commentary on America’s condition, on how society is divided and furious, and mob mentality is transforming all to waste.

The Kiss by Dana Schutz.

Changing Themes

In the other gallery space, the artist appears to shift her focus to the leaders and elites, rather than the crowds that support them. Mysterious forms stuff their mouths with grapes and steak in a sombre dining room; a cardinal and a man in green recline in golden chairs – whereas in other works a couple console each other in a scene filled with dead bodies, and a woman, maybe Schutz herself, lies naked, forlorn and powerless in a bed.

Inspirations and References

This is ultradense, thickly layered art, covered in references. You’ll find the ethereal dream-like signs of a symbolist master, the pink, corporeal animation of an American painter, the festive bizarre elements of a Belgian artist, the large-headed oddities of a contemporary artist. There are riffs on the art historical tradition, countless nods to mainstream media (It seems certain that a particular work is a portrait of Handsome Squidward from an animated series). You could spend hours identifying all the elements from classic painters with which she’s sprinkled the artworks.

A Model by the exhibitor.

Meaning and Stories

Painting this dense, intricate and symbolic leaves itself open to interpretation. I feel as if one is tested on the symbolism of a Titian but, in my view, there are two relatively clear narratives: the ruling class, and the crowds that they bait.

The 2017 Scandal

And the artist understands about that. In 2017, her artwork Open Casket – a partly abstract representation of the body of a historical figure, a black teenager who was lynched by racist perpetrators in Mississippi in 1955 – caused untold controversy when it was displayed at the Whitney Biennial. She was accused of exploiting black death for her own gain. A protester picketed the work daily, and some demanded it to be destroyed. A white artist depicting – perhaps compassionately – a scene of black pain was the major headline of the event. It was the peak of the recent social conflicts, a period that featured infighting even if they were on the identical team. Looking back now, in a world more divided, simplified and more hostile than ever, it feels almost quaint that people had the time to get upset at this emotional, mournful painting.

Aftermath and Recent Art

This might have ended her professional life, and Schutz probably wants to progress. But all her subsequent work since exists in its shadow. She inevitably emerged of that ordeal a changed artist. But what remains constant is her exceptional skill, how she still engages in brilliant, sickly, gloopy and deeply political art at the top tier.