The Louvre, Gray Weather, Afternoon 1902

This small oil on canvas, The Louvre, Gray Weather, Afternoon, was made by Camille Pissarro sometime in the late 1800s. I can just imagine Pissarro standing there, trying to capture the light on the river Seine. He’s building up the image with these short, choppy strokes. The colors are muted— lots of grays, browns, and blues—but somehow he makes it sing. It’s like he’s not just painting what he sees, but also what he feels. I bet he wrestled with it too, unsure of every dab of paint he put down. He's part of a long line of painters, wrestling with the same problems: How do you capture light? How do you make a flat surface feel like a whole world? It’s like one big conversation that goes on through the ages.