El pez buey 1906

Alfred Kubin conjured 'El pez buey' with ink and watercolor, and the alchemy of those materials lends itself to nightmares. I can almost feel Kubin wrestling with the image, coaxing it from the murky depths. Look at the swirling brushstrokes, the way the colors blend and bleed. He’s not just painting a fish-ox; he’s conjuring a primal fear, a visceral unease. What was he thinking? What was he feeling? Did he have bad sushi? The way that eye just stares, unblinking. It’s like it sees right through you, into the darkest corners of your mind. And the colors, those sickly yellows and browns, they evoke a sense of decay, of something rotten lurking beneath the surface. Goya would have liked this. It's a reminder that artists are always in conversation with one another, riffing on old themes, and exploring new territory. And that painting, at its best, is a way of grappling with the unknown, of giving form to the formless.