Love is an intimate painting about integrity and ambition. The apple, a traditional academic subject of painters nevertheless takes on Biblical significance when placed against a cosmic, abstract background. As such, it suggests the Eastern parable that the whole universe is contained in a single blade of grass. This is not a simple intellectual exercise though. A mélange of associations remind us that while knowledge caused man's fall from grace it is also essential to our survival and natural function. Learning and experience then become our tools for developing wisdom and compassion. All this adds up to some undeniable contradictions, but even as the red and yellow forms may embody both tragedy and hope, it can still be summed up in that notorious, L-word for which the piece is titled? love.