Willy Bo Richardson has been making paintings from a visual language he began developing in the late 1990s. What does it mean to stay with a language for nearly three decades—
The surprise is not that Richardson has remained faithful to his vocabulary. The surprise is that the vocabulary has remained unexpectedly elastic. This places Richardson in a lineage that includes Josef Albers, Robert Ryman, Agnes Martin, and, in a different register, Robert Irwin— because each artist accepted formal limitations in exchange for heightened perceptual freedom.
Music to Drive To gathers more than seventy paintings alongside essays, conversations and reflections on the practice. There is a foreword by Stephanie Buhmann, an essay by Katy Crocker, and a conversation with the gallerist and mentor Max Protetch. Richardson’s autobiographical essay, “Dad, Why Do You Paint Stripes?,” takes up a question that is both more elementary and more difficult than it first appears.
The book resists the familiar retrospective’s temptation to turn an artist’s career into a succession of breakthroughs. Instead, it makes a case for continuity as a form of inquiry. One comes away with the impression that Richardson paints this way because, after decades of testing alternatives, he discovered he could not honestly paint otherwise.
Designed by Joseph Gilbert, the paintings are allowed to establish their own rhythm before the essays intervene. Full-bleed reproductions, details, installation photographs, and carefully paced transitions create a visual tempo that encourages browsing as much as reading. One can enter the book almost anywhere and still sense its underlying cadence.
Edited by Will Palmer, and published by Eastern Gate Publishing, Music to Drive To will celebrated its launch and signing on September 1, 2026, from 5:00–7:00 p.m., at CLAMP, 247 West 29th Street, Ground Floor, New York City
Preview pages and ordering information are available at willyborichardson.com/book