Deerstalking 1938

André Derain made this painting, *Deerstalking*, with oil on canvas, and you can see he's playing with a limited palette to create this sort of tonal unity. It feels like he's more interested in the process of image-making than representing an actual scene. Look at how Derain has flattened the space, pushing the figures and animals right up to the picture plane. The whole thing is bathed in this warm, almost monochromatic light, and the brushwork is smooth, with very few visible strokes. But then you see these odd, almost cartoonish details, like the way the dogs are rendered, or the strange, staring eyes of the figures. There's a tension between the overall calmness of the colour and the slightly unsettling quality of the scene itself. It reminds me a little of the work of Henri Rousseau, another French painter who was interested in creating dreamlike, imaginative worlds. In both cases, there's a sense of naiveté, a kind of playful innocence that allows them to explore different ways of seeing and experiencing the world.