La fenêtre ouverte 1911

Henri Matisse made this painting, ‘La fenêtre ouverte’ - The Open Window - using oil paint, and you can tell the paint is quite thin, almost translucent. I can imagine Matisse standing in front of the canvas, mixing colors, stepping back, squinting, trying to capture the light and feeling of the scene. The way he’s painted that window, it’s like another painting within the painting, you know? A world opens up. The whole thing feels intuitive, like he's letting the painting lead him. And I think, "Yeah, that's what it's all about!" I'm sure he was looking at a ton of other paintings and letting them seep in. We all do it! It's like we’re all just in this big conversation across time. We see something cool that someone else did and think, "Oh yeah! I want to try that!" And so we all keep pushing each other forward. We are all in it together.