Throughout history artists have represented the seasons. From Michaelangelo to Joseph Albers and Ellsworth Kelly, artists have been interested in the emotional and philosophical value of color. Red stands out and can symbolize aggression, while blue hangs back, suppresses the appetite and makes one feel serene. Yellow, like C­sharp on the piano, is for happiness. When children draw the sun, it is yellow. In Matthew Morrocco’s new series -­Orchid.Summer­­ - we are met with a yellow monochrome figure gazing into an infinite landscape. The figure wanders through the pictures as if singing a too­late­love­song for something they lost. While humans were busy remaking the earth in their own anthropocentric image, nature has continued to ebb and flow with the seasons all the while never ceasing to bring us the brilliant colors of the rainbow. But for how much longer?

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This new body of work explores the use and value of that colorful figure within the natural landscape. The colorful suit is emblazoned across the image. At first it appears pleasant but on second viewing seems to smear the landscape with its stark, colorful, and compositionally averse fury. The figure does not fit into the landscape but rather stands outside, as if contemplating the twilight years of the earth as we know it. The figure, though yellow, appears melancholic as it traverses this groomed landscape, seemingly in search of a sublime vista that no longer grants access to that world of fruitful natural wonder.

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The figure stands against itself, both as a compositional and emotional element with the images as if to declare that abstraction is dead. It is not color that matters within the images but the interaction of the figure within the landscape. Morrocco places this melancholic monochrome figure at the centerpoint of this work to discuss our problematic anthropocentric drive, catalyzing our better impulses toward a more symbiotic coexistence.