Interventionist Demonstration (Why-A-Duck?)

“I push things to the point where I have no idea what’s going to happen,” painter Charline von Heyl has said. “I am interested in trying out something that might seem paradoxical and impossible . . . forcing them to work with grace and ease.” At 17 feet long, the elaborately titled Interventionist Demonstration (Why-a-Duck?) is her largest work to date. Part text and part painting, the canvas layers scrawled language and patterns over a field of loose, abstract gestures—like banners or bumper stickers tumbling and jostling across an atmospheric surface. The work generates a palpable energy, while harboring half-buried references to histories of the cartoon, graffiti, decorative painting, and expressive abstraction.