The 2018 rooftop archive: seventeen paintings I forgot I had photographed

In 2018 I painted on the roof. Not a studio — the roof of the building, canvases on the ground, and whatever the weather was doing. I photographed most of it on my phone at the time and only exported the photos this month: 223 photos and short clips from that year, most of them of paintings I had stopped thinking about.

What was in it

Seventeen pieces I could identify and catalogue, now numbered 042 to 058. Lights Camera Action, red and white with taped diagonals and a crossed square in the corner, then black thrown over the top: the cleanest thing I made that spring, ruined on purpose. In the Trees, 20 x 24, thrown until there was no canvas left. Interstellar, three black discs and a bar on a 2ft x 6ft strip of unstretched canvas, which hung tacked straight to the wall at the old apartment. 4 Seasons, 5ft x 11ft, also unstretched, the biggest thing from that year.

Four of them are on paper — 16 x 12 inches, made on the kitchen table that spring to try things out before going big. I'd never put a work on paper in the catalogue before. They're 055 to 058 now, and at $450 they're the cheapest way to own a piece of this.

What had already gone

A few had found their homes years ago and I'd never recorded it. Abstract Collage, the sponge-stamped grid with black and yellow thrown over it, hung in my living room and then in someone else's. The three-panel black-on-white that took the whole kitchen wall, No. 051, went too. And Pendulum, from that November, which is the one that ended up on television. They're all in the catalogue with the note that they've found their home, because the record should be complete even when there's nothing to buy.

Why it matters now

The 2018 work is looser than what I make now and I like it more than I expected to. It's also the year the black-on-white throws got big — Pendulum, and the three-panel piece that took the kitchen wall. If you want to see where the current work comes from, the photos are on The studio, under "On the roof, 2018", and the paintings that are still available are in the shop tagged 2018.

About the author. Charles Black is a self-taught painter working in acrylic on canvas from a two-room studio at the back of a warehouse in Queens, New York, and the founder of ABB Collective. He has been posting the work as @abstractbyblack since 2022 and has placed paintings in bars, offices and private homes around New York. Questions about anything here: charles.s.black@gmail.com.