Méditation c. 1960

Marc Chagall made this painting, Méditation, with oil on canvas. The palette is muted, restrained – wintry even. The colours are soft and the marks are gentle. It's easy to see the layering and blending, which gives the impression that he wasn’t interested in hiding the process of artmaking. I am struck by the texture – those soft scumbles of greys, whites, blues, and greens. It looks like snow and skin all at once. The paint is applied in such a way that it feels both delicate and substantial, an interesting contrast that draws you in. I am particularly drawn to the man’s jacket and how Chagall uses this rich green-blue to give it a life of its own. It feels as though the jacket is as important as the figure wearing it. Chagall’s contemporary, Chaïm Soutine, also painted with this sort of dream-like freedom, but with a very different intensity – like an older, angrier brother. With Chagall, like all great art, we find something that feels both familiar and deeply strange.