In Far Off Drums, an exquisite painting that is both vital and harmonious, Macdonald resolved the crucial issue of space and the relation between figure and ground. The elements here are fluid, and there is a finely balanced tension between line and the thinly painted surface.

Macdonald taught that “non-objective masterpieces are created intuitively—are alive with spiritual rhythm and organic with the cosmic order which rules the universe.” His final works transcend the material world and find an expression of the spiritual beyond.