is the personal website and blog of Sterling Bowen. I’m an abstractionist, blogger, aspiring curator and occasional instructor living in Raleigh, NC. Scroll down to see posts, use the menu for more on my practice. If you’d like a little bit of Art in your inbox every day, subscribe (and tell a friend, please).
Blog topics include my practice, Art and society. There are also around 2,000 posts about other artists, with a focus on non-figurative modalities.
Photo credit to Bryan Putnam.
This week I got to check off one of my 2026 goals- having a piece of writing published.
Thanks to Burnaway for being the first periodical to give a new writer some air time. You should all support them!
Is a recent Hopper Prize Winner. They explore our psychological and emotional connection to place and memory, specifically in relation to ruination, surface, and decay, and how these themes link with notions of mortality.
#jodennis
like Kosuke shows at Rainrain gallery. Magrogan does not paint in any traditional sense of the term; he sculpts. In their practice, the durational process of painting glitches into multiple, overlapping temporalities.
#jamesonmagrogan
has work up at Oneoneone atm. Including two images below because the artist is showing new work on rice paper, and work from the early 2000s on raw silk. In the latter case, it was hard for me not to think about the state of abstract painting in the that timeframe, and how the pro-intellect, antiromantic sentiment in Art and view of painting as completely dead and invalid likely made these poetic stain works that were quoting non-Western philosophy stand out and not in a positive way (the artist related during their talk, how they found the practice unsatisfying at the time, although I am reading into context with my observation).
Viewers who feel that they see a strong east Asian influence in these would not be wrong- at the artist’s talk, they discussed the relationship of transparent materials to the non-solidity of being ( in terms of both literal energy, and the relationship of reality to the mind), as well as the interplay and visual interdependence of layers in the work as a metaphor for the philosophical concept of interconnectedness of life. Yes, I see a few echoes of Ross as well.
#catalinaarocena
was born in Guayaquil, Ecuador and lives and works in New York, NY. Quevedo’s practice spans installation, drawings, and prints, incorporating and subverting aspects of abstraction, painting, collage, cartography, and sports imagery. Deeply engaged with notions of identity, Quevedo reenvisions pre- and post-colonial iconographies. They show with Alexander Gray.
#ronnyquevedo
Sommer Browning reviews Thương / Nhớ, a textile installation by Phượng-Duyên Hải Nguyễn that evokes memory and lived human experience, for Burnaway.
More
#phuongduyenhainguyen
is renowned worldwide for her textile artworks and architectural installations that draw from her multifaceted approach, uniting artistry and ecological stewardship in a profound and enduring artist-activist vision.
#claudyjongstra
On the final day of Black History Month, I want to give snaps to my favorite living painter, who happens to be a person of color, Stanley Whitney. At the highest level, I actually don’t have anything to add to what’s been written about him, other than I have wanted to lick every one of his paintings I’ve ever seen in person. #sorrynotsorry
I have Stanley to thank for my introduction to John Yau, who did a great write up on Stanley and two other painters* in the context of a two-location exhibit with Lisson Gallery in NYC in 2018, around the time my practice reignited.
Stanley popped to the top of mind for me not so much because of the importance of February for all of us to educate ourselves, but because, like Jack, Helen put his show at ICA Boston last year on her top shows list. (link is to Spotify)
*btw, that Yau article also makes note of Harriet and Melissa; speaking of fantastic painters who are also female, Stanley’s spouse Marina is an effing savant with color as well.
Update- this video with Stanley includes my favorite quotable bit of wisdom from him regarding following a painting out the window (just watch- link will take you to YouTube).
#stanleywhitney
embraces uncertainty in his painting practice, exploring the tension between destruction and reconstruction, using abstraction as a strategy to alter preconceived ideas. He is an instructor at SAIC in Chicago.
#rushbakeriv
gets snaps in the most recent South edition of New American Painting. They are “drawn to the parallels between (their,) human body and the natural environment.”
(Maybe also check out Emma and Jane)
#alexandramcgowan
like Sharon has shown with CLEA RSKY a project-based space that showcases artistic experimentation and irreverent exhibition formats.
Marcus’ work explores the transformative power of light. Drawing from his lived experience within the carceral system (much like Sherril), Manganni first developed techniques such as reflection, refraction, and sun mapping while in solitary confinement.
more
#marcusmangiani
Is in Street Corner Conversations with Sharon and Wendy. Mitchell’s work explores boundaries and control. Beginning with a linen surface lying flat on a table, she dribbles white acrylic and clear medium, smooshing it intuitively with her fingers. Once dry, she chooses oil colors straight from the tubes. Using a tiny brush and very little pigment, she carefully stains the white underpainting with oil paint.
More and more (below is 35×40 btw)
#arielmitchell
is in Street Corner Conversations at McBride / Dillman with Sharon and Ariel Mitchell. approaches painting as a site of reconstitution. (From the gallery) “Drawing from experiences of impact, imbalance and illumination, she treats paint as both skin and medium, layering translucent and opaque color, then sanding, scraping and carving to reveal fiery forms.”
#wendyfulenwiderliszt
Jack had a really great moment in 2025, and deservedly so- Helen Molesworth put his retrospective at the top of her “best shows” list (link is to her year end wrap on the David Zwirner pod “Dialogues”). I did not get to see The Messenger but I did see to see 9.11.01 shortly after MOMA reopened in 2020.
In the snobbish spirit of “I dug him before you guys,” I first blogged about Jack in 2019 to note a fantastic show at the Baltimore Museum of Art which (posthumously) included his work and many others* and which at the time, inspired me to create a “gallery” on Pinterest of Jack’s work.
I also really like to show my students, when I have occasion to teach, this wonderful (YouTube) Art21 video that includes some interview audio with Jack made while he is in his studio.
*I’ve previously blogged about a number of exhibits including above at BMOA, which center the practice of nonfigurative art work created by Black Americans. I’ll note that Black artists on this blog are not all of African descent, and, if you are interested in what artists from Africa are up to, I have a hashtag for that, too.
More (Wikipedia)
#jackwhitten
Painting After Art is Dead 