Quai De Seine 1924

Lucien Pissarro made this hazy waterscape with oil on canvas; can’t you just imagine him trying to capture that pale light? There's something about the way he’s dabbed on the paint, thick and thin in places, that makes me think he was really feeling the chill of the air. I can almost see him standing there, squinting, trying to nail that particular shade of grey that hangs over the river. I wonder if he felt like he was wrestling with the light itself. That moment when the sun is still trying to break through, and everything is muted, softened. The way the brushstrokes blend into each other is a beautiful thing; it really does feel like the whole scene is dissolving, or emerging out of the mist. Pissarro was part of a whole community of painters who were all about this kind of close observation; they all had a similar curiosity and passion for the real world and the feelings it evokes. Painting becomes a process of inquiry into what it means to be human.