Predicted Cloud 1921

Nicholas Roerich made "Predicted Cloud", but when and with what, I couldn't say. It’s a striking image, with its warm, earthy tones contrasting against the cool, ethereal blues and purples of the sky. I'm really drawn to the texture of the piece; the buildings almost seem to be made of sand, as if they’re rising organically from the desert floor. Look how Roerich has built up the surface with layers of paint. You can almost feel the grit and roughness of the adobe. Then, those cloud figures looming in the background, they're like a mirage, adding a dreamlike quality to the scene. There's something so simple, so direct about the way the forms are rendered, it reminds me of early modernist painters like Marsden Hartley, who were similarly drawn to landscapes and simple geometric shapes. Ultimately, this painting feels like a meditation on impermanence and the cyclical nature of time.