Czóbel Béla Roland Holtd 1917 1917

Bela Czobel painted this portrait, Czóbel Béla Roland Holtd, in 1917. Check out the brushwork here. It's pretty direct and the colours are laid down in simple blocks. It gives the work an overall feeling of a calm process, a kind of 'no nonsense' approach. I find myself really drawn to the surface of this piece. The paint isn't too thick, but you can definitely see the marks of the brush. It looks like he mixed the colours right on the canvas in certain parts of the painting. Look closely at the subject’s jacket - you can see how the different browns and yellows blend together with each brushstroke. It's this kind of honest mark making that I find so inspiring. Czobel's work from this period reminds me a little of early Kirchner, a contemporary also working with flattened planes of colour. But where Kirchner is all angular and jagged, Czobel's got this real human warmth. It's a reminder that art's not about answers, but about opening up the conversation.