finished Youth 1951

Hossein Behzad made this painting called 'finished Youth', and what I see is a gorgeous orange and red colour palette and a seated figure under a tree, contemplating life, maybe its losses or its turning points. I can imagine Behzad in the act of painting, going back and forth, maybe trying to achieve a sense of balance between the figure and the environment, between the real and the imaginary. He's sitting there; he's done a beautiful rendering of an old man sitting under a tree covered in orange leaves. I mean, leaves that are actually falling on him, so he is literally being covered by these leaves, which also look a bit like flames. Maybe he's thinking about impermanence and about how everything is connected. What a beautiful painting to sit with. It feels like an invitation to slow down, reflect, and to be in conversation with painting, with artists of the past, and with ourselves.