Turkestan [Mountain Silence] 1937

Nicholas Roerich gave us ‘Turkestan [Mountain Silence]’, made with tempera on cardboard. Roerich's work is like a stage set, and a mystical one at that. The colours are so simple, blues and browns, but it’s all about the surface. He makes these dreamy, almost ethereal landscapes using tempera. You can almost feel the dry, chalky texture, right? Look closely, and you'll see it's not about smooth blending, but about letting the brushstrokes create this hazy, almost vibrating light. That foreground mountain, it’s this solid blue shape, like a cut out, but the way the paint’s applied, it feels like it’s breathing. You can imagine how the paint dried quickly, forcing Roerich to work fast, capturing a fleeting moment. It reminds me of the simplified forms and spiritual leanings of artists like Hilma af Klint, they both embraced a kind of visual shorthand to convey deeper, unseen realities. It's less about what you see, and more about what you feel. And that, my friends, is the magic of painting, isn't it?