For 40 years, Al Loving experimented with materials and process to expand the definition of modern painting, drawing on everything from free jazz to his family’s quilting tradition. In the 1980s, Loving broke free of the flat image, using heavy rag paper to make three dimensional collages in brilliant colors. Spiral Play features 12 of these collages, some of them monumental in scale. The work is radical, beautiful, and deeply human. In the artist’s words, “I chose the spiral as a symbol of life’s continuity. It became an overall wish for everyone.”

This exhibition is co-curated by BMA Dorothy Wagner Wallace Director Christopher Bedford and BMA Senior Research & Programming Curator Katy Siegel.

Spiral Play: Loving in the ‘80s was co-organized by The Baltimore Museum of Art and Art + Practice.

Al Loving. Barbara in Spiral Heaven, 1989. Mixed media on paper collage. Estate of Al Loving and Garth Greenan Gallery, New York.