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Dana Schutz smothers her canvases in thick gobs of viscous pigment. Her first proper London show is a messy, exuberant tribute of her medium, but significant themes are subtly embedded if you can scratch your way towards them.

The Artist's Technique

Schutz’s approach – earning her acclaim as one of the most important figurative artists of her generation – is focused on texture, application, colour and materiality. This is art for artists, real high-level art-nerd stuff. Should you enjoy losing yourself in layers of pigment and shadow, there’s enough here to engage you for a while. But it’s her bizarre, dreamlike, animated, symbolic visuals that truly drives the artworks resonate.

Works in the First Gallery

These pieces in the initial room are full of giant-headed cyclopses and roaring mobs. One piece shows a group of figures stomps senselessly towards something outside the frame, brandishing fists and creating a path of trash in their path. In another presents a person given a huge mask in some bizarre ceremony in front of a crowd of ugly supporters. It’s easy to read any of this as social commentary, as commentary on the state of the US, on how society is divided and furious, and crowd psychology is transforming all to rubbish.

The Kiss by the artist.

Shift in Focus

In the other gallery space, the artist appears to redirect attention to the leaders and elites, instead of the masses that follow them. Shadowy figures stuff their mouths with fruit and meat in a gloomy eating space; a religious figure and a man in green recline in golden chairs – whereas in other works a couple console each other in a scene filled with dead bodies, and a woman, perhaps the artist, lies naked, forlorn and powerless in bed.

Influences and Allusions

This is extremely complex, multi-layered stuff, filled with references. There’s the dreamy surreal symbolism of Odilon Redon, the pink, corporeal animation of Philip Guston, the festive bizarre elements of a Belgian artist, the big-headed weirdness of a contemporary artist. She includes nods on the history of painting, countless nods to mainstream media (It seems certain that one painting is a depiction of Handsome Squidward from an animated series). You could spend hours identifying all the bits of Cézanne and David with which she’s littered the works.

The Example by the exhibitor.

Meaning and Stories

Art this complex, complex and allegorical leaves itself open to analysis. I feel as if one is tested on the symbolism of a Titian but, for my money, there are two relatively clear narratives: the ruling class, and the public that they provoke.

The 2017 Scandal

And Schutz should know about that. Back in 2017, her painting a titled piece – a partly abstract representation of the corpse of a historical figure, a young African-American who was murdered by racist perpetrators in Mississippi in the mid-20th century – caused untold controversy when it was shown at the Whitney Biennial. Critics charged her of exploiting black death for her own gain. A protester demonstrated against the painting daily, and some called for it to be removed. An artist of European descent painting – arguably with great sympathy – a image of black pain was the major headline of the biennial. It was the peak of the late 2010s culture wars, a period that saw people turning on each other even if they were on the same side. Looking back now, in a world more divided, simplified and angrier than ever, it seems almost charming that individuals found moments to get angry at this heartfelt, sorrowful artwork.

Aftermath and Recent Art

It could have ruined her professional life, and Schutz probably wants to move on. But everything she’s done since exists in its influence. She unavoidably emerged of that experience a transformed creator. But what remains constant is how good she is, how she still engages in masterful, unsettling, gloopy and deeply political painting at the top tier.