View from Koli 1923

Eero Järnefelt made this artwork, 'View from Koli', probably in his studio, but surely from sketches he had made in situ. I'm thinking about the way the colours sit side by side. They are so vibrant; it's a vision, not a direct representation of nature. The mark-making is free, confident, even bold; you can see the coloured pencil dancing across the surface. It is the kind of art that emerges through intuition, with little adjustments and corrections along the way. I can imagine Järnefelt looking at other landscape painters, probably feeling a competitive urge to translate his vision. There's a conversation happening, right? Between artists, across time, inspiring each other. It feels like Järnefelt is saying: nature is a beautiful idea, but my experience of nature is even more layered and complex. What if it can only ever be an approximation? What if the real thing lies in the feeling of the thing? Like a chord, the colours and gestures of the drawing resonate with possibility, eluding any single, fixed meaning.