http://mitakuyeoyasinn.blogspot.com/2011/05/glenn-ligon.html
Formulaic
http://www.capitalnewyork.com/articl ture/2012/10/6538741/glenn-ligon-lights-lu gustine-though-few-works-remain-d
Ligon discussed the shift from abstract painterly paintings to his well-known stenciled text based paintings. The battle to incorporate text and paint together has been a clash for most painters-with painters either choosing text or paint. He abandons the painterly and focuses on the text. When he does this the process becomes most important. This praxis can be seen as repetitive formulas that lead to the exact same result, a gradient. Ligon’s stencil begins, as clear as a representational painting, and then slowly gets destroyed by the process. Yes the text is important, but more important is the formal visual element of the calligraphy. Ligon is responding to the typography as an icon to be smashed, similar to aspirations of the abstract expressionist DeKooning’s woman 1. This body of work has more to do with obliterating the icon of type than it does the deconstruction of text. Icon “Even my Richard Pryor paintings,” he went on, referring to a series of work based on jokes told by that black comedian, use a common racial epithet. “Turn on the radio,” he said. “A word like that is so archaic, it’s not of this time. It’s about language.” http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/27/arts/design/27ligon.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1& 67