Triangle Within a Circle

"Robert Mangold has developed a form of painting which, despite the limitation of means, displays a wealth of memories and longings. He has emphatically refused to break with traditional painting, or for that matter with abstract art, doomed though it may be. Thus, his self-imposed limitations only seem radical in as much as his canvases are not only meant to appeal to the spirit. These strict limitations rather lie at the root of the painter's will to bring about an equilibrium of spirit and soul, so as to create a clear unity in a painting. Just as his colleagues have done for centuries, Robert Mangold wants to make a 'good' painting. A good painting, as an 'area' where, at the right moment, a complex of painterely elements finds their right place. He has reduced this complex to the problem of two basic pairs, form/line, colour/surface, avoiding all ornamentation.

On the first level his paintings are strictly viewing lessons, where evil has been made a virtue. Whereas illusion tied to a two-dimensional plane was rejected by other artists, Robert Mangold uses that illusion to create a harmonius image through that very disruption. His circles aren't circles, they are only experienced as such. Despite the irritation caused by the discrepancy between the eyes and knowing, - the fact that there isn't a circle, while a circle is perceived - Mangold knows how to create an image of stable equilibrium."
(A. Van Grevenstein, op. cit.)