Though the tiger in this prep study for Walton Ford’s painting Chay, now on view in his solo show at Gagosian Gallery, looks ferocious, it represents an animal that is injured and seconds away from finding relief. Tragic misunderstandings or false assumptions about animals throughout history inform Ford’s large watercolor, gouache and ink drawings. In the finished painting (also included in the show), a tiger leaps into a pool of water, ropes trailing from his body in a reenactment from a Vietnamese folk tale about how a farmer’s trickery results in the tiger’s stripes. (On view in Chelsea through April 23rd).
