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The American painter smothers her paintings in thick gobs of viscous pigment. This inaugural London show is a messy, exuberant tribute of her medium, but significant themes are subtly embedded if you can scratch your way towards them.

Schutz's Approach

Her method – earning her acclaim as one of the most important figurative artists of her era – is all about texture, application, colour and materiality. This is art for artists, real high-level art-nerd stuff. Should you enjoy losing yourself in layers of pigment and shading, there’s enough here to keep you going for a long time. But it’s Schutz’s grotesque, surreal, cartoony, symbolic visuals that really makes the artworks resonate.

Initial Exhibition Pieces

The works in the first gallery are full of enormous one-eyed beings and baying crowds. One piece shows a group of figures trudges mindlessly toward an event outside the frame, brandishing fists and leaving a trail of debris in their wake. In another features a figure receiving a large disguise in an odd ceremony in front of a horde of ugly supporters. It’s not hard to interpret these as political, as commentary on America’s condition, on how society is divided and furious, and crowd psychology is turning everything to waste.

An Embrace by the artist.

Shift in Focus

In the other gallery space, the artist appears to redirect attention to the leaders and elites, rather than the masses that support them. Mysterious forms stuff their mouths with fruit and meat in a sombre dining room; a cardinal and a man in green recline in gilded seats – while in other works a pair console each other in a landscape strewn with dead bodies, and a woman, perhaps the artist, lies naked, desolate and helpless in a bed.

Influences and Allusions

This is ultradense, thickly layered art, covered in references. There’s the dreamy surreal symbolism of Odilon Redon, the fleshy pink cartoonishness of Philip Guston, the carnival grotesqueries of a Belgian artist, the large-headed oddities of Paul McCarthy. There are riffs on the history of painting, numerous references to pop culture (It seems certain that one painting is a portrait of a cartoon character from SpongeBob SquarePants). It would take time spotting all the bits of Cézanne and David with which she’s littered the artworks.

A Model by the exhibitor.

Meaning and Stories

Art this complex, complex and allegorical leaves itself open to interpretation. It seems like I’m being quizzed on the meaning of a Titian but, for my money, there are two relatively clear narratives: the ruling class, and the public that they bait.

Controversy and Impact

And the artist understands about such dynamics. Back in 2017, her painting a titled piece – a partly abstract representation of the body of a historical figure, a young African-American who was murdered by two white men in a southern state in 1955 – sparked immense debate when it was displayed at the a New York exhibition. Critics charged her of profiting from tragedy for her own gain. An activist picketed the work each day, and some demanded it to be removed. A white artist depicting – perhaps compassionately – a scene of African-American suffering was the major headline of the biennial. This marked the height of the late 2010s culture wars, a period that featured infighting even if they were on the same side. In retrospect, in a world increasingly polarized, less nuanced and more hostile than ever, it seems almost charming that individuals found moments to get upset at this emotional, mournful painting.

Aftermath and Recent Art

This might have ended her career, and Schutz probably wants to move on. But everything she’s done now exists in its shadow. She unavoidably came out of that ordeal a changed artist. But what remains constant is how good she is, how she still engages in brilliant, sickly, gloopy and deeply political art at the top tier.