Tomma Abts’ paintings’ names

[Tomma] Abts gives all her paintings titles that she selects from a dictionary of German first names. We lingered before one called Meko, a red, white, and green painting with an op-art feel. Critics describe her paintings as “living things” that incite “inter-subjective confrontation.” Abts frets about which paintings are exhibited together and exactly how they are hung, as if she were arranging the seating plan for a dinner party and it would be a disaster if Teete sat too close to Folme. When I mentioned casually that I’d be curious to see her dictionary of first names, Abts looked alarmed, moved toward the table, tossed a sweater over the mysterious volume, and said, “It is better if it is unknown.”

—Seven Days in the Art World (2008), by Sarah Thornton