Joe Andoe

American, 1955

Tulsa-born painter Joe Andoe is known for his austere depictions of everyday subjects, such as roadsides with cloud-filled skies, horses, dogs, and flowers. For his painting, he uses a reductive technique where he covers an entire canvas with thick black oil paint, then wipes off the paint while still wet to reveal an image beneath, creating an enigmatic and textural minimalism. “Since the late ‘70s I have fancied myself a landscape painter, and a painter of the things that hang around on the landscape” wrote Joe Andoe in his memoir Jubilee City (2008). In his recent work, Andoe underscores the possibilities of imagery by developing a cinematic vision of American mythologies. Often compared to the photographic documentation of teenage life in Tulsa by Larry Clark, Andoe’s universe has emerged as one great depiction of the American spirit and its iconography.

Courtesy Almine Rech