Contributed by Paul Behnke / Pinkney Herbert’s exhibition “In Between” at David Lusk Gallery regards a painting less as a finished image than something unfolding in time. The title points to a place of transition where matters are not fully settled but are still taking shape. Herbert has long divided his time between Memphis and New York, and itineracy seems to carry into the work. Structure, rhythm, color, and pace energize paintings that never completely resolve. Across the exhibition, Herbert denies the viewer a stable place to land. Lines shift direction, forms collide, and constructs loosen almost as soon as they appear.
In In Between 2, heavy black angular lines suggest architectural frameworks or mapped routes. That clarity slips as white and gray planes move forward and backward, rendering spatial depth uncertain. The eye keeps adjusting, trying to fix the image, only to be redirected. Time becomes visible. Here, Herbert connects with the school of contemporary abstraction that casts painting as less about perfect composition than lived experience. In Alcazar, fragmented forms suggest walls or fortified structures, but nothing feels permanent. Edges slide past one another, openings appear and close, and color interrupts any sense of solidity. What first reads as stable gradually feels provisional. The work asks less what a building is than how it is experienced.
If these two paintings emphasize structure, Land and Sea moves toward atmosphere. The title suggests landscape, yet Herbert never allows the painting to become descriptive. Horizontal movements hint at a horizon before breaking apart into color and gesture. Blues and bright, high-key tones circulate across the surface without settling into sky, water, or ground. Rather than depicting a place, Herbert evokes how it is remembered or sensed. What fortifies “In Between” is Herbert’s refusal to choose between opposites. Control and improvisation, geometry and gesture, planning and intuition all remain active. This reflects a larger trend within abstraction itself. Earlier modernist painting often aimed for clarity or purity, something complete and discrete. Herbert argues that abstraction retains vitality because it remains inherently unfinished.
“Pinkney Herbert: In Between,” David Lusk Gallery, 97 Tillman Street, Memphis, TN. Through March 14, 2026.
About the author: Paul Behnke is a Memphis-based abstract painter who has also lived and worked in New York and New Mexico.
