Inspired by the music of Archie Shepp.

The composition relies on a rigorous geometric grammar: rectangular blocks of deep black, dark olive green, and sharp, vivid orange are arranged according to a logic akin to Neo-Plasticism. Yet this cool architecture is punctuated by ink stains, splatters, streaks, and drips that introduce gesture, chance, and the night.

"Round About Midnight" originated as a standard by Thelonious Monk (1944), but Archie Shepp made it his own, transforming it into something entirely different: a tense, nocturnal meditation steeped in free jazz and the memory of African American blues.

I sought to visually capture the dramatic nature of Archie Shepp’s work: a form that holds its ground, a menacing night, and—suddenly—an outpouring. The orange is perhaps the only light in this night, the impossible note, Shepp’s cry piercing the darkness "round about"—in the vicinity of—midnight. Neither at its very heart nor outside it. In that unstable in-between space that characterizes the most authentic jazz.