Aftermath by James Edward Scherbarth

Three red shapes on black, and the small marks around them have not settled yet.

Aftermath is a 2020 painting by James Edward Scherbarth, in oil and cold wax medium on cradle board. Abstract paintings of this kind are made to convey a mood rather than a scene, and the stiff, buttery medium holds the marks of a blade, which are the event here. A charcoal black field covers most of the board. A broad slab of red sits near the top, with two smaller ones low on either edge, one of them running off it. Flecks and dashes of red scatter between them. Thirty-six inches wide and four feet high.

The title gives no details. It does not need them.