On Looking Into This R.H. Quaytman

R.H. Quaytman, ד Chapter 24, 2012, 20 x 20 in., ink and gesso on plywood, selling at Rago Arts You were staring at R.H. Quaytman’s painting on the auction website, wondering if you were going blind trying to figure out what was happening. This is not something that would happen if you’d seen it installed at the Museum Abteiberg in Mönchengladbach in 2012. Because you’d know immediately that you were standing in front of a 20 x 20 inch plywood panel with a beveled edge, that had an image screenprinted on it of a slightly crushed black cardboard box with a die cut square window near the top, and a library label wrapped around the side. RH Quaytman, Dalet, Chapter 24, 2012, published by the Museum Abteiberg, image via Saint Martin Bookshop And it’d be seemingly obvious that the box resembles Quaytman’s own catalogue for the show, ד (Dalet), Chapter 24, which was made in the mode of the often incredible box catalogues Josef Beuys and the museum’s director Johannes Cladders began producing…