A Model Seated on a Bed 1938

Alexandre Jacovleff gave us this oil painting, ‘A Model Seated on a Bed’. It’s all rapid pink and red gestures, quickly, freely applied. You can see the way the brushstrokes dance across the canvas. Imagine the artist’s hand moving, deciding, correcting, the painting coming into being through a process of trial, error, and intuition. I can’t help but think about the pose—the model, the bed, the patterned wall hanging. I wonder what Jacovleff might have been thinking at this time? There’s an immediacy in the texture, the color. The paint isn’t overly thick, but each stroke is deliberate, communicating feeling, intention. It's like Jacovleff and the Fauvist painters played with the same freedom of expression, but with a cool restraint. Jacovleff’s work is part of an ongoing conversation, an exchange of ideas across time. Painting is an embodied expression which embraces ambiguity, allowing for multiple interpretations. It’s an invitation, not a fixed statement.