Steven Cox interviews painter Jeffrey Kessel, whose work is on view at Thierry Goldberg Gallery, New York, through December 23, 2012.

Kessel comments: "Despite the unrestrained spontaneity of my studio practice, the paintings can often be fairly tight and structured. It's true; I work intuitively and never plan paintings out in advance. I also work fast, its very physical. I'll wipe out or cover up a painting on a whim. I don't like to tinker. They stay fresh this way, it keeps them from closing in and they have energy because of it. But I wouldn't describe it as expression. Somehow they’re more pointed than that, representative of labor and physical materiality…  I’m not sure a broad painterly vocabulary is necessarily important in itself. Within a body of work or a single painting the language need not be varied or complex, as long as it’s explicit."