PROVENANCE:
Galerie Birch, Copenhagen

Walasse Ting started out as an abstract painter and later began focusing on the human form in the 1970s. After living in New York City for more than a decade, he became well-acquainted with many celebrated American pop artists, such as Andy Warhol, Tom Wesselmann, and Roy Lichtenstein. Ting and these other artists often created works centering on a topic that reflected truthfully their lives: the female body and flowers. To Ting, flowers and women are inseparable. He spent his whole life exploring the seductive beauty of women, and he was an expert at depicting their inherent softness and attractiveness. On the artist’s canvas, women are invariably accompanied by flowers, birds, cats—any objects of vivid beauty.

Ting once said, “Whenever I see an attractive woman or a beautiful flower, they always trigger my elusive sensitivity. Appreciating them makes me feel alive and active. They give me feelings I never had before, as if I were reborn out of those beautiful things. I use colors of various tones to ignite energy and love on the canvas.” While residing in Paris, Ting was fascinated and influenced by Henri Matisse’s works. He pursued the same purity and fullness as Matisse did in his paintings.

This particular piece, Catch Me If You Can, was painted in 1977 at a time when the artist had already transformed his style from abstract presentation to figurative depiction. He makes adroit use of saturated acrylic paints, skillfully changing his techniques from swaying and spreading to tracing, dropping, and applying. He cleverly chooses the same watery blue for the color of the woman’s stockings to match her eye shadow, conjuring a seductive pose among the flowers. With a subtle perfection, Catch Me If You Can depicts a woman gazing at the viewer with provocatively flirtatious eyes, hinting at a careful and languid expression that reveals her demands.