Square Berlioz (La Place Vintimille) 1915

Édouard Vuillard made this painting of Square Berlioz, or La Place Vintimille, with oil on cardboard, and right away I'm drawn into this intimate vision of a public space. Vuillard layers greens, browns, and yellows, creating a textured surface that almost feels like the dappled light filtering through leaves. Looking closely, you can see how the paint is applied in short, broken strokes, giving the impression of movement and life. The way he handles the foliage in the foreground—it’s like he's inviting us to dive right into the scene. There's a kind of ambiguity that I find really appealing. Is it a landscape, a genre scene, or both? This reminds me a little of Bonnard, another artist who was interested in these fleeting, everyday moments. But while Bonnard’s work often has a dreamlike quality, Vuillard’s feels more grounded, more real. Both artists embrace a certain degree of ambiguity, of course. After all, why settle on one interpretation when there are so many possibilities?