Shekar-Dzong 1928

Nicholas Roerich made 'Shekar-Dzong', and well, it’s a trip. The lavender and ochre palette is so striking. Roerich’s mark-making feels intuitive; it’s like watching a painter think through colour. The texture is pretty smooth, but you can tell it’s oil - there’s something chalky and matte about it. I'm drawn to the way the paint describes the light on the mountain – those horizontal strokes give the impression of geological time, like each layer of pigment is a stratum of rock. Roerich's approach makes you consider how we experience landscape as a process, not just a view. This work reminds me of Marsden Hartley. Both artists were spiritually motivated and preoccupied with simplifying landscapes into elemental forms, but Roerich has a mystic intensity all his own. Ultimately, the painting embraces this kind of open-ended dialogue about how we connect to the world.