"Body & Soul: Six Decades of Joan Snyder’s Abstraction" by Ana Novi

On view at Thaddaeus Ropac London through February 5, 2025, “Body & Soul” offers an unprecedented journey through six decades of Joan Snyder’s pioneering artistic practice. Spanning from her early Stroke paintings of the 1960s to new works created this year, the exhibition traces the evolution of Snyder’s deeply personal and visceral language of abstraction. Known for her fearless interweaving of autobiographical elements with rich material experimentation, Snyder has consistently challenged the male-dominated movements of Minimalism, Abstract Expressionism, and Color Field painting.

Through her profound engagement with themes of love, grief, joy, and spirituality, Snyder has expanded the boundaries of contemporary abstraction. Her use of unconventional materials—straw, dried herbs, plastic grapes, and glitter—imbues her paintings with tactile and emotional resonance, creating works that are as much about physical presence as they are about transformation. Recurring motifs such as flowers, ponds, trees, and bodily forms reappear throughout her oeuvre, not as fixed symbols but as evolving reflections of her life’s phases and artistic reinvention.

In “Body & Soul,” Snyder’s work becomes a compelling dialogue between the material and the metaphysical, inviting viewers to witness moments of alchemy where the personal becomes universal, and the physical intertwines with the spiritual. Whether evoking the solemnity of altars, the exuberance of symphonies, or the cyclical rhythms of nature, Snyder’s art resonates with an unflinching honesty that situates female subjectivity and emotion at the heart of her practice.

Read the full article at whitewall.art.