“The Propitious Garden of Plane Image, Second Version” and “The Propitious Garden of Plane Image, Third Version,” both 2000-6, are Mr. Marden’s big statements, the results of a tightly controlled experiment to exploit the color spectrum in a rigorous way, and they’re the last works in the retrospective. Everything builds to this “crescendo,” as Mr. Garrels put it. The subtle difference between the two works is that in the second version, the looping forms are self-contained within the six single canvases. But in version three, “it starts flowing from panel to panel,” Mr. Marden said. “That might have come with working by the Hudson. It’s very interesting. This is a very abstract, formal enterprise. And then you turn around and you have the river.” [http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/29/arts/design/29loos.html] A significant portion of Marden's work emerged in the 1980s after he visited Asia and developed an interest in the art of the Far East. Beginning with the Cold Mountain series, these pieces have often taken the form of monumental canvases whose direct inspirations are the poems of the Tang dynasty Chinese poet Han Shan, a wilderness recluse whose name translates to "cold mountain." The most obvious traces of Marden's interest in Asian art in these works are the swirling lines, which make reference to the calligraphic forms of much Asian poetry, but also contain an element of winding, uncoiling energy that never seems to end, but continues to move or dance across the surface of the six panels. The Propitious Garden of Plane Image, Third Version reflects the way in which Marden's later paintings often build on his earlier experiences, creating a kind of "layered" autobiographical content. It is steeped in personal references, beginning with Marden's longtime preoccupation with light and process. Its six adjacent panels create one long horizontal band of colors - from left to right, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple - and are embellished with swirling lines using the same base colors. Each panel is not simply one color but rather a combination of layers of each colors of the visible spectrum, which results in the top color. The red panel, for example, was created by subtraction, applying first a purple band, topped by blue, green, yellow, and orange, revealing the red band. Each consecutive panel is created the same way using all the other colors. The notion of process here is also suggested by the swirling lines' resemblance to the dancing streaks of paint of the mature works of the Abstract Expressionist Jackson Pollock, whose works proved an inspiration for Marden's formative activity. Marden's interest in numerology is present here with the number six, his most important figure. There are six panels of the painting, each panel is six feet high, and the length of the work is 24 feet, (a number whose digits added together equals six). Perhaps most telling is Marden's own consideration of this work as a self-portrait, as the notion of the "propitious garden" in the title is meant to reference his own success and fortune. Likewise, Marden identifies with the "plane image," given that his reputation is built almost entirely on painting and works on paper. Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York [http://www.theartstory.org/artist-marden-brice-artworks.htm]