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Some artists paint to communicate what they mean, and some to find out what they mean, while some simply make objects that others find meaning in. But don't fall for that crap about a work of art simply being appreciated for itself.
Never is there use for a work that is meaningless. If a work does not signify, it cannot escape being insignificant. And it is unlikely that a totally meaningless work could ever exist anyway.
On the other hand, being significant has nothing to do with the quantity of signification: it is a matter of the coherence and importance of conjunctures that the work can generate with its context.
This, however, has not deterred the exuberant Scott Redford from playing with enough signification to make your hair curl. With unabashed zeal Redford makes assemblages that push the inflation of meaning to its limits and then sprays them with a homogenizing layer of black paint.
His dream, he says, is to buy a work by Davida Alien, whose gestural Expressionism he admires, and paint it black.
In the tradition of Andy Warhol, Redford has many such stories and explanations concerning his work. But no matter how engaging these expressions of personal preference may be, an artist’s whim alone cannot be considered to lend any import to the work. And anyway none of these tales can be taken at face value.
A clue to Redford's true meaning is the fact that many of his drawings, as well as some of his paintings, reveal an equal interest in minimalism. The "techniques" of both minimalist and maximalist approaches to him are thus ultimately equivalent as methods. And through the leveling effect of black