Sarah Morris

Born Sevenoaks, United Kingdom, 1967.  Lives New York and London

Cinerama [Los Angeles], 2005
Household gloss paint on canvas
113 ¾ x 113 ¾ inches
Collection Miami Art Museum, museum purchase with funds from the MAM Collectors Council

Photo credit: Peter Harholdt

Sarah Morris is a painter and filmmaker whose work deals with the language of the urban environment.  Her work typically involves representations of corporate, political or commercial buildings - the architecture of power. Morris uses household gloss paint to render these façades as flat blocks of bright color, which she organizes into hard-edged grids on square-format canvases. Around the time that she painted Cinerama [Los Angeles], the structure of Morris' compositions became less regimented, with the architectural referents giving way to a more abstract, vortex-like impression. The subtitle calls to mind the distinctive urban layout of Los Angeles, with its combination of gridded plan and disorienting sprawl.