The documentary, which came out a year after the artist’s death in October 2018, is about painter Jaan Põldaas, who represents something of the Toronto that once was. A Toronto that was trying to make its artistic mark side-by-side with its confident, cultured cousin, Montréal.
A recent trip to the Art Gallery of Ontario, viewing a painting by Mark Rothko in their Moments in Modernism exhibition, summoned the memory of Põldaas, and provoked a question. What is it that differs from artist to artist or movement to movement when it comes to abstract, colour-focused paintings?
