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The American painter cakes her paintings in heavy layers of viscous pigment. Her first proper London exhibition is a splodgy, orgiastic tribute of her medium, but some big messages are subtly embedded if you manage to uncover them.

The Artist's Technique

Schutz’s approach – which has seen her lauded as a leading figurative artists of her generation – is all about texture, application, colour and materiality. This is art for artists, real high-level aesthetic geekery. If you get your kicks losing yourself in layers of pigment and shadow, there’s enough here to engage you for a long time. But it’s Schutz’s grotesque, surreal, cartoony, symbolic visuals that truly drives the artworks resonate.

Works in the First Gallery

These pieces in the first gallery are populated by enormous one-eyed beings and baying crowds. One piece depicts a group of figures trudges mindlessly toward an event outside the frame, waving hands and creating a path of trash in their path. In another features a person receiving a huge mask in an odd initiation ritual in front of a crowd of ugly supporters. It’s not hard to read any of this as political, as observation on America’s condition, on societal splits and furious, and mob mentality is turning everything to waste.

An Embrace by the artist.

Shift in Focus

In the other gallery space, the artist appears to redirect attention to the leaders and elites, rather than the masses that support them. Mysterious forms stuff their mouths with grapes and steak in a sombre dining room; a religious figure and a man in green sit back in golden chairs – whereas in additional pieces a pair comfort one another in a scene strewn with corpses, and a female figure, perhaps the artist, rests naked, desolate and powerless in a bed.

Inspirations and References

This is ultradense, thickly layered stuff, covered in allusions. You’ll find the ethereal dream-like signs of Odilon Redon, the fleshy pink cartoonishness of Philip Guston, the festive bizarre elements of James Ensor, the big-headed weirdness of a contemporary artist. She includes nods on the art historical tradition, numerous references to mainstream media (It seems certain that one painting is a depiction of a cartoon character from an animated series). You could spend hours identifying all the bits of Cézanne and David with which she’s sprinkled the works.

The Example by the exhibitor.

Interpretation and Narratives

Art this complex, intricate and symbolic leaves itself open to interpretation. It seems like I’m being quizzed on the meaning of a Titian but, for my money, there are a couple of distinct narratives: the people in power, and the crowds that they provoke.

Controversy and Impact

And the artist understands about that. In 2017, her painting a titled piece – a semi-abstracted depiction of the body of a historical figure, a young African-American who was lynched by racist perpetrators in a southern state in 1955 – sparked immense debate when it was displayed at the a New York exhibition. She was accused of profiting from tragedy for her personal benefit. An activist demonstrated against the work each day, and some called for it to be destroyed. An artist of European descent painting – perhaps compassionately – a scene of African-American suffering was the biggest story of the biennial. It was the peak of the late 2010s social conflicts, a period that saw people turning on each other even if they were on the same side. Looking back now, in a society increasingly polarized, less nuanced and more hostile than ever, it seems almost charming that people had the time to get angry at this heartfelt, sorrowful painting.

Aftermath and Recent Art

It could have ruined her professional life, and Schutz probably wants to progress. But everything she’s done since exists in its influence. She inevitably emerged of that experience a changed artist. But what remains constant is how good she is, how she continues to practice in brilliant, sickly, gloopy and deeply political art at the top tier.