Still life with kelaghayi 1973

Sattar Bahlulzade made this still life with kelaghayi sometime in the twentieth century, layering blues and whites in textured brushstrokes across the canvas. I'm curious about what was going through his mind. Maybe he was thinking about the interplay between patterns. Look at that kelaghayi cloth, which looks like a portal into another dimension. You can see the juicy, thick paint handling—the way the brushstrokes almost dance on the surface. I can imagine him working wet-on-wet, pushing the paint around, letting it mingle and merge. You can sense the sheer joy of handling the medium. There is a conversation happening here between Matisse and Milton Avery. Bahlulzade is responding to those artists and adding his own voice to the mix. You get a feeling of embodied expression here and you can see his experimentation with colour and form. It’s like he's inviting us to join him in this ongoing exploration.