Eric Orr approached painting by way of the immaterial. A Kentucky native who traveled across North America as a teenager and was a civil rights worker in Mississippi, Orr moved to Venice, California, in 1965 to work for sculptor Mark di Suvero and soon became interested in the art of Light and Space.
Orr explored the possibilities of art making through spiritual, elemental, and alchemical means, often using materials such as lead and gold foil, fire and water—as well as his own blood and hair. For his monochromatic Without Red, the artist became a shaman or alchemist, transmuting “lowly” aspects of his own body into “high” art. Orr’s use of various metals in this painting alludes to the supposed alchemical transformation of the base metal lead into exalted gold.
Carol Eliel