Blur

Once you get over (and past) all the gorgeous Roman heads populating SAM like so many effigies of lost loves (or as a friend remarked, "maybe that was a fashionable nose at the time"), you might stumble across Field 13, a landscape that reads as though you'd forgotten your glasses at home. This singular work is by L.A.–based, Berlin-born photographer Uta Barth. Possessing the sensual feel of a painting, the pigments in this 1996 photograph look like they've gone blurred. Or perhaps this is the view from a fast car. The landscape is a smeared green, lit with a gentle glow, and it reads, well—in the center of the museum—like a window. This photograph has the effect of making you question your sight, as your eyes struggle to focus. It's a piece that might be about speed or distraction. Or, more simply, green. In late 2000, the Henry Art Gallery mounted one of the first retrospectives of Barth's work, showing both interior and exterior landscapes, all blurred. I missed it, and wish there were more than one work of hers on view at SAM right now.