School of Athens 1961

Cy Twombly made this "School of Athens" with paint and maybe some crayon, it looks like he was thinking about history, but also, totally in the moment. The surface has all these scrawls and marks, like he's scratching into time itself. See how the colors are muted, with these pops of red and yellow? It's like a whisper of something ancient, but done with a totally modern, throw-away gesture. Look at that little brown mark, a tiny horse shape that looks like it was dashed off in a second. It's almost nothing, but it gives the whole thing a sense of movement. Twombly reminds me a little of Joan Mitchell, because they both make painting feel like a kind of messy, beautiful conversation. Art is like that, just one big, ongoing scribble across time.