Albert
Irvin

Bold colour was central to Irvin's work. He used as a powerful emotional and expressive tool. Irvin's palette was often described as 'high-key', featuring vibrant oranges, pinks, purples, and yellows. These highly saturated colours gave his works a bold and forceful presence.

Irvin's paintings are characterised by their sense of movement and energy. His gestural brushstrokes and dynamic compositions create a sense of rhythm that draws the viewer into the work. This approach was influenced by American Abstract Expressionism, particularly the work of Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock. However, Irvin developed his own style, incorporating geometric elements and structured compositions that balanced the more spontaneous aspects of his work. This tension between structure and spontaneity became a hallmark of his mature style.

Although primarily known for his paintings, Irvin was also a printmaker. He began experimenting with screenprinting in the 1970s, drawn to the medium's potential for creating bold, flat areas of colour. Irvin approached printmaking with the same experimental spirit as his painting. In Irvin's 1991 screenprint Greenwich II a rich blue dominates the piece, interspersed with areas of deep green, purple, and hints of red. These bold, overlapping shapes generate depth and energy, much like his large-scale paintings. The contrast between the saturated hues and the restrained palette creates a dynamic rhythm across the surface, capturing Irvin's interest in colour relationships and his ability to evoke movement through abstraction.