Portrait of the Painter Ivan Bilibin 1901

Here is Boris Kustodiev's portrait of the painter Ivan Bilibin. With its muted greens and blacks, it’s easy to imagine Kustodiev working on this piece, shifting and adjusting the paint to capture something of Bilibin’s character, the essence of him. I bet Kustodiev was thinking about what it means to portray another artist. The texture looks thick, like the paint was laid on with real intention, especially in the way the light catches Bilibin’s white shirt. It’s almost as if the shirt is a blank canvas, ready to be filled with ideas. Then there's that single red rose! Placed there to shock you out of the sobriety of his suit and the green background. Artists are always responding to each other, aren’t they? They make a conversation through their work, across time. Painting is like that - it’s about embracing the unknown, allowing for multiple readings. It never gets old.