Sometimes you never know what you’ll find in Bushwick. During Bushwick Open Studios, I stumbled upon the work of Summer Wheat — her real name she assured me — and was taken aback by the quality and intensity of her work.

Her paintings struck me at first as a type of painterly macrame, which seem to hover on the surface of more conventional abstract canvases. The three-dimensional layer of paint creates a net-like form and often incorporates words that evoke race, childhood imagery and memory — one read COLORED BABY=WHITE BABY.

The effect is delicate and powerful while also being simultaneously contemporary and arcane. She shies away from talking about her work as abstract painting but she is obviously comfortable with that language, as she is with the dialects of other low and high art styles.

Her “My First Rap Song” (2009) mesmerized me by its simplicity accompanied by a hurricane of colors. She renders a misogynistic rap song by an African-American male into a visual style that takes its cues from antebellum quilt patterns. The subject matter is charged, yet she depicts it with an casual ease that renders it poignant and beautiful without relying on a superficial or obvious meaning.

For more pics from my studio visit with Summer, click here.