Exhibition

Walter Price
Pearl Lines

Ground Floor

Pink and blue painting with star shapes and text that reads, “WALTER PRICE Pearl Lines MAY 12 – JUNE 18, 2022.”
Installation view of two paintings on perpendicular walls to each other. On the right is a brown and purple painting, on the left is a mostly blue painting, and in the middle is an opening with windows on the ceiling and a shelf. The walls are white and the floor is concrete.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

When You See a Good Move, Find a Better One reads the title of a recent work by Walter Price—as if to summarize the restless experimentation at the core of his lush, irreducible approach to painting. Price’s second solo show at Greene Naftali intensifies the brisk blend of representation and avid formalism for which he is known, creating a singular style in which figuration and abstraction cannot be cleaved apart.


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Square mostly blue painting with some areas of black, pink, white, and beige hung on a white wall.

Walter Price

BK knight, 2022

Acrylic and gesso on canvas

61 x 55 x 1 1/2 inches (154.9 x 139.7 x 3.8 cm)

Installation view with two white walls perpendicular to each other. On the right is a small pink painting, and on the left is a large rectangular brown painting with some areas of purple, green, and blue.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

Painting with swirling dark colors, a sliver of blue, and three green squares containing eyes.

Walter Price
Rules of social proof
, 2021
Acrylic, gesso, and Flashe on canvas
56 x 102 x 1 1/2 inches (142.2 x 259.1 x 3.8 cm)

Installation view with two white walls perpendicular to each other. On the right is a large rectangular painting with a mix of various colors, most notably brown, yellow, and blue. On the left is a smaller square painting with a mix of various colors, most notably brown, yellow, and green.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

Painting with swirling blues, browns, and greens.

Walter Price

Knitting together the story, 2021

Acrylic, staples, photos, and glue on wood

60 x 80 x 2 inches (152.4 x 203.2 x 5.1 cm)

Installation view with three paintings on the white walls and an opening in the corner. On the right is a blue painting, on the left is a multicolored painting and, next to it, a small square painting in green and pink.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

This new body of work often expands Price’s dense mental landscapes to a more ambitious, near-panoramic scale, in which swathes of vibrant color give way to recurring motifs, still legible but increasingly unmoored. Contoured planes of dark pigment sport curled eyelashes that transform them into faces in silhouette, observing the picture plane; plush sofas (a symbol of interiority and comfort) dissolve at their edges or burst into flames.

Painting with bright colors, including green, blue, black, brown, gold, and red.

Walter Price
You are your best thing
, 2021-2022
Acrylic and gesso on wood
12 x 9 inches (30.5 x 22.9 cm)

Painting with green in the middle overlaid with red brushstrokes and surrounded by yellow.

Walter Price
When you see a good move, find a better one
, 2022
Acrylic, screws, plexiglass, and gesso on wood
48 x 72 x 2 1/4 inches (121.9 x 182.9 x 5.7 cm)

Painting featuring various shapes and outlines with swirling clouds in dark blue tones.

Walter Price

Getting house, 2022

Acrylic, vinyl, and gesso on fabric

56 x 102 x 1 1/2 inches (142.2 x 259.1 x 3.8 cm)

Painting with blue, green, and brown shapes and the word "say" twice.

Walter Price, Getting house, 2022 (detail)

Installation view with three paintings on the wall, windows on the ceiling, and a column to the left. Starting from the right is a painting of red, yellow, and blue flames on a beige background; next to it is a blue and gold painting; and then finally is a purple mix media painting.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

A purple board with hanging paintbrushes and a clipped photograph of a child.

Walter Price

Myths make language, 2022

Acrylic, enamel, staples, glue, zip ties, paint brushes, photo, and screws on wood

30 x 40 x 5 1/2 inches (76.2 x 101.6 x 14 cm)

Artwork with swirling patterns in muted gold, blue, and green tones.

Walter Price
I don't wanna make somebody else. I wanna make myself.
, 2022
Acrylic, gesso, vinyl, tacky glue, and clothes pegs on fabric
56 x 102 x 1 1/2 inches (142.2 x 259.1 x 3.8 cm)

Painting with red, orange, and yellow shapes resembling flames, contrasted by deep blue areas on a grayish backdrop.

Walter Price

Its the fire that holds our attention 2, 2022

Acrylic, gesso, and drawing ink on wood

60 x 80 x 2 inches (152.4 x 203.2 x 5.1 cm)

Painting with flame-like shapes and text on the edge.

Walter Price, Its the fire that holds our attention 2, 2022 (detail)

Black text on a white background that reads, “Here I am, wowed by Pearl Lines, a large show at Greene Naftali of paintings and drawings by Walter Price…The forms of his eloquently colorful art, which mingles imagery of banal manufactured objects with evocations of fire and water, can seem at once to fly apart and somehow to precipitate ineffable harmonies.” Signed by “Peter Schjeldahl, The New Yorker.”

Walter Price, Its the fire that holds our attention 2, 2022 (detail)

Installation view of four paintings with a column in the middle. Starting from the right is a rectangular painting with pink, blue, red, orange, and yellow; next to it is a green and brown painting; then there is a very small painting; and on the far left is a large blue rectangular painting.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

Painting with blue, purple, and brown colors, featuring black dashed lines and textured shapes.

Walter Price

I was really in the field you just skip bayless, 2022

Acrylic, gesso, Flashe, drawing ink, and graphite on canvas

65 x 156 x 1 1/2 inches (165.1 x 396.2 x 3.8 cm)

Image with blue-gray background, featuring a blue shape and a white shoe print.

Walter Price, I was really in the field you just skip bayless, 2022 (detail)

“Location is as indeterminate as qualities are abundant in Price’s settings,” Darby English has written, and these latest works portray a borderless space largely governed by the action of paint itself, which Price applies to the canvas in ingenious ways and keeps moving while it’s wet. Circular skids trace the path and speed of the artist’s hand at work, and his paint-covered footprints likewise bear physical witness to his passage. Indeed, motion and mobility (in various guises) are at stake in each of the works: from the push-pull of matte and metallic colors to directional vectors of dotted line, or the preponderance of chess pieces across his canvases—objects strategically defined by how they can move. Those stray pawns, knights, and rooks (like all the imagery Price favors) are both playful and vaguely portentous: lures for the eye that also allude to more consequential theaters of conflict.

Painting with a brown silhouette on a textured purple background.

Walter Price
Wherever you go there you are
, 2021-2022
Acrylic and gesso on wood
12 x 9 inches (30.5 x 22.9 cm)

Painting with multicolored stars on a reddish-brown background and faint outline of a face.

Walter Price

Strabus, 2022

Acrylic, gesso, and oil pastel on canvas

53 1/2 x 61 x 1 1/2 inches (135.9 x 154.9 x 3.8 cm)

Painting with swirling pink, blue, and yellow colors.

Walter Price

Every play is a battle, 2022

Acrylic, gesso, vinyl, and chrome pen on wood

50 x 102 x 3 inches (127 x 259.1 x 7.6 cm)

Painting with swirling pink, blue, and yellow colors.

Walter Price, Every play is a battle, 2022 (detail)

Price’s roving sensibility also extends to the viewer, whose senses and mind are urged to wander—ambiguity is cultivated in his work, but for reasons more generous than evasive. The exhibition’s title, Pearl Lines, underscores the centrality of drawing to his practice, evidenced in two galleries dedicated to works on panel and on paper that celebrate his skills as a draughtsman. Narrative ties seem to adhere between works but break down on close inspection; each scene is strange and self-contained, a holdout from interpretive closure. Pearl Lines collects these fresh attempts to bring emblem and gesture into wayward alignment, ceding resolution to pursue instead what English calls a certain “aboutness, deeply trustful of loose connection, preferred to landing.”

Installation view of three paintings in a gallery with white walls, a concrete floor, and an opening in the corner. Starting from the right is a yellow painting, and perpendicular to it is a light blue and dark blue painting.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

Mostly light blue painting with a horse head silhouette in brown, and geometric shapes in blues and whites.

Walter Price
Retrograde analysis
, 2021
Acrylic, gesso, and oil pastel on canvas
61 1/2 x 93 x 1 1/2 inches (156.2 x 236.2 x 3.8 cm)

Painting with red, blue, black, and green, featuring various brushwork and textures.

Walter Price

Even speech corrodes, 2022

Acrylic and gesso on canvas

47 1/2 x 61 x 1 1/2 inches (120.7 x 154.9 x 3.8 cm)

Painting with yellow, red, and white colors, featuring swirling and splattered brushstrokes.

Walter Price

I done had some fire fights, Soon as I kick door, I ran through smoke, 2021

Acrylic and gesso on fabric

31 x 45 x 1 1/2 inches (78.7 x 114.3 x 3.8 cm)

Black text on a white background that reads, “We all come from different perspectives, and the brain is ready to decipher things quickly–abstraction challenges this. It allows more of your story to be added on to my story.” Signed by Walter Price.

Walter Price

I done had some fire fights, Soon as I kick door, I ran through smoke, 2021

Acrylic and gesso on fabric

31 x 45 x 1 1/2 inches (78.7 x 114.3 x 3.8 cm)

Installation view of three paintings: two are to the left on black walls and the remaining one is in the neighboring room on a white wall, visible through an opening to the right. The paintings respectively are orange, blue, and yellow.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

Painting with orange, blue, and purple colors, featuring outlines of chess pieces.

Walter Price
Cis Stems
, 2022
Acrylic, pigment, and gesso on wood
30 x 30 x 1 1/2 inches (76.2 x 76.2 x 3.8 cm)

Painting with red, blue, and green with outlines of human faces.

Walter Price
Expound on your own
, 2022
Acrylic, drawing ink, and gesso on wood
30 x 30 x 1 1/2 inches (76.2 x 76.2 x 3.8 cm)

Walter Price
Cis Stems
, 2022
Acrylic, pigment, and gesso on wood
30 x 30 x 1 1/2 inches (76.2 x 76.2 x 3.8 cm)

Walter Price
Expound on your own
, 2022
Acrylic, drawing ink, and gesso on wood
30 x 30 x 1 1/2 inches (76.2 x 76.2 x 3.8 cm)

Installation view with four paintings in the foreground and four paintings in the neighboring room, visible through an opening in the corner. Starting from the right the paintings are orange, yellow, and multicolored, most notably purple, brown, green, and blue. Both the walls and the ground are black.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

Painting with an area of brown in the middle surrounded by green. Above that is a mix of purple, gray, dark blue, and pink. To the right is a blue shape resembling a horse’s head.

Walter Price
So a boxer and mother stop at a gas station
, 2021
Acrylic, photo collage, and gesso on wood
47 3/4 x 72 x 2 1/8 inches (121.3 x 182.9 x 5.4 cm)

A collage artwork with layered torn papers, including colors like black, blue, and pink, featuring a yellow face and magazine text.

Walter Price

Atlien, 2021–22

Collage, drawing ink, PVC glue, and acrylic on wood

10 x 8 inches (25.4 x 20.3 cm)

A mixed-media collage with a black-and-white photo obscured by bright yellow alien faces amid colorful posters and text elements.

Walter Price

Atlien, 2021–22

Collage, drawing ink, PVC glue, and acrylic on wood

10 x 8 inches (25.4 x 20.3 cm)

Walter Price

Atlien, 2021–22

Collage, drawing ink, PVC glue, and acrylic on wood

10 x 8 inches (25.4 x 20.3 cm)

Walter Price

Atlien, 2021–22

Collage, drawing ink, PVC glue, and acrylic on wood

10 x 8 inches (25.4 x 20.3 cm)

Collage on a yellow background with drawn alien heads over photo faces.

Walter Price
Atlien 2
, 2022
Collage, photo, colored pencil, and graphite on paper and color plexi frame
Paper: 12 1/4 x 7 1/2 inches (31.1 x 19.1 cm)
Frame: 15 x 10 1/2 inches (38.1 x 26.7 cm)

Artwork with a yellow background and overlapping figures in red and brown tones.

Walter Price
Celebrating without wins makes you weak, 2022
Collage, graphite, oil pastel, pen, acrylic, and ink on paper with color plexi frame
Paper: 13 3/4 x 10 5/8 inches (34.9 x 27 cm)
Frame: 14 3/4 x 11 5/8 x 1 1/2 inches (37.5 x 29.5 x 3.8 cm)

Walter Price
Atlien 2
, 2022
Collage, photo, colored pencil, and graphite on paper and color plexi frame
Paper: 12 1/4 x 7 1/2 inches (31.1 x 19.1 cm)
Frame: 15 x 10 1/2 inches (38.1 x 26.7 cm)

Walter Price
Celebrating without wins makes you weak, 2022
Collage, graphite, oil pastel, pen, acrylic, and ink on paper with color plexi frame
Paper: 13 3/4 x 10 5/8 inches (34.9 x 27 cm)
Frame: 14 3/4 x 11 5/8 x 1 1/2 inches (37.5 x 29.5 x 3.8 cm)

Installation view of ten artworks on two black walls perpendicular to each other. The wall on the right has two paintings, one that is multicolored with mostly blue, purple, and red with an area of green, and the other is orange. On the left wall are eight mostly yellow drawings. The ground is black.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

Yellow background with black drawings of various figures that are mixing into each other. Starting from the left is a figure wearing glasses and a hat, above that is a closeup of a face with glasses and missing teeth, in the middle is a mixture of objects and possible faces, and to the right is a figure closing one eye with their mouth open. The surrounding area has black scribbles of various densities and shapes.

Walter Price

Circus, 2022

Ink on paper and color plexi frame

Paper: 11 3/4 x 8 7/8 inches (29.8 x 22.5 cm)

Frame: 14 1/2 x 11 1/2 x 1 3/8 inches (36.8 x 29.2 x 3.5 cm)

Yellow background with black drawings of various figures. Starting from the right is a tall figure with curly hair and glasses, then is a shorter figure with a prominent forehead and wrinkles, behind them is a figure with short hair and bangs, and on the far left is a figure with their hair in a bun. Between the figures with the bangs and the bun is another figure that is difficult to distinguish.

Walter Price

Its gonna be ok. Right?, 2022

Ink on paper and color plexi frame

Paper: 11 3/4 x 8 7/8 inches (29.8 x 22.5 cm)

Frame: 14 1/2 x 11 1/2 x 1 3/8 inches (36.8 x 29.2 x 3.5 cm)

Walter Price

Circus, 2022

Ink on paper and color plexi frame

Paper: 11 3/4 x 8 7/8 inches (29.8 x 22.5 cm)

Frame: 14 1/2 x 11 1/2 x 1 3/8 inches (36.8 x 29.2 x 3.5 cm)

Walter Price

Its gonna be ok. Right?, 2022

Ink on paper and color plexi frame

Paper: 11 3/4 x 8 7/8 inches (29.8 x 22.5 cm)

Frame: 14 1/2 x 11 1/2 x 1 3/8 inches (36.8 x 29.2 x 3.5 cm)

Installation view of fourteen artworks, eight on the left wall and the remaining six on the right wall. The wall and carpeted floor are black, and on the ceiling are skylights. In the middle of the room is a bronze sculpture of a feline.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

Drawings of various figures and faces on brown paper, most notably in various shades of blue but also in gray and orange. Starting from the top are two figures: one is wearing glasses and the other only their eyes and nose are visible. In the middle are three figures: to the left their face is upside down, in the middle they are gray with glasses, and to the right they are dark blue. In the lower left are orange hands.

Walter Price

Hazmat, 2022

Acrylic and ink on wood

12 x 9 x 1 5/8 inches (30.5 x 22.9 x 4.1 cm)

Drawing of various figures in purple, gray, and red on a brown paper. Starting from the left is a gray figure with glasses sitting on a red contraption with wheels.

Walter Price

"Can i sang my song?", 2021–22

Acrylic and ink on wood

12 x 9 x 1 5/8 inches (30.5 x 22.9 x 4.1 cm)

Drawing of five figures in black on brown paper. Starting from the right the figure has short hair, above them is a large face with prominent teeth, below them is a figure with a pear shaped face and hair bordered by blue, above them is a face turned to the right, and on the far left is the profile of a face. The figures are surrounded by black.

Walter Price

Out of the box like HB, 2022

Acrylic and ink on wood

12 x 9 x 1 inches (30.5 x 22.9 x 2.5 cm)

Walter Price

Hazmat, 2022

Acrylic and ink on wood

12 x 9 x 1 5/8 inches (30.5 x 22.9 x 4.1 cm)

Walter Price

"Can i sang my song?", 2021–22

Acrylic and ink on wood

12 x 9 x 1 5/8 inches (30.5 x 22.9 x 4.1 cm)

Walter Price

Out of the box like HB, 2022

Acrylic and ink on wood

12 x 9 x 1 inches (30.5 x 22.9 x 2.5 cm)

Bronze-colored sculpture of a seated feline on a dark carpet.

Walter Price

The Protector, 2022

Bronze

26 1/4 x 24 x 17 inches (66.7 x 61 x 43.2 cm)

Installation view of eleven artworks. On the left are five artworks hung in a row, and on a perpendicular wall to the right are six artworks hung in a row. In the corner is an opening into the neighboring room with four additional artworks hung on the wall.

Walter Price, Installation view, Pearl Lines, Greene Naftali, New York, 2022

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