The Eye 1965

Beauford Delaney made this painting, titled ‘The Eye’, using a thick impasto of oil paint. I see how Delaney starts with a fairly limited palette of blues, oranges, and yellows, but then keeps mixing them together wet on the canvas, scumbling and layering until something new emerges. The texture is really important here, it's almost like he’s sculpting the form out of paint. See how the blues and browns coalesce to give form to the head and neck, while the oranges define the titular eye, giving it a sense of inner light and vitality. The background, by contrast, is a looser, less defined field of yellow and white. You know, this kind of reminds me of some of Van Gogh's portraits, where the paint becomes almost as important as the subject, a kind of conversation between form and process. Ultimately, I think this piece is about how seeing isn't just a passive act, but an active and creative process.