Art Seen: Birth of a Superhero, Find More Light and Intuitive Abstraction

In its Winter 2025 feature, Art Seen presents Ian James Roche’s practice through two paintings: Birth of a Superhero and Find More Light. The saved page combines those reproductions with a concise account of the artist’s development, from a visit to Dia Beacon to an ongoing practice in Commack, New York.

Two paintings, different rhythms

Birth of a Superhero fills its reproduced frame with a busy interplay of curved forms, contrasting colours and shifting directions. Find More Light offers a different arrangement: broader areas of colour surround a more concentrated central form. Seen together, the images suggest that intuitive abstraction need not produce a single repeated compositional pattern.

Looking between them can change how a viewer understands the word “energy.” In one painting, movement may be experienced through many competing paths. In another, attention can gather around a central relationship of shapes. These are visual readings of the reproduced works, rather than claims about a fixed symbolism.

Spontaneity and a sense of discovery

The Art Seen profile links Roche’s beginnings to Sol LeWitt’s wall drawings and Richard Serra’s sculptures. It also identifies his father’s pastel work as an influence on his choice of medium. Sheetrock became a way to explore an architectural scale using soft pastel.

The account emphasises a practice led by discovery rather than a predetermined outcome. It describes the artist drawing on dreams, personal experiences and wider cultural influences while allowing a composition to develop. That approach helps explain why the paintings can feel related without being interchangeable: the process leaves room for each work to establish its own balance.

Spiritual expression without a single prescribed reading

Roche’s language of transformation places the work in a personal and spiritual context. A viewer does not need to share a particular belief to engage with it. Colour, scale, rhythm and the relationship between forms provide immediate ways into the paintings; Ian’s own writing can then add another layer of understanding.

Begin with the full artwork pages for the two paintings, rather than relying solely on the magazine reproduction. Continue through the pastel archive to compare other compositions, or read Ian’s biography for the experiences that shape this body of abstract art. The original Art Seen page remains available through the source link below.