Nude Female Model (Reading On The Seashore) 1930

William Orpen made this dreamy nude, reading by the sea, with oil on canvas. The brushwork here is so loose and dreamy, like trying to remember a perfect day at the beach. The way he's daubed the colors together feels improvisational, like he’s mixing paint and memory, a kind of process as feeling. Look at the way the blue of the sea meets the pink of the sky: there is a definite horizon line, but the way the colors bleed into one another makes it feel like the painting is breathing. Orpen’s got this balance between the fleeting and the permanent. The pink of the nude feels like it echoes the pink of the sky, and both are set against the solid blue of the water. It's almost like he’s saying that beauty, even if it's temporary, has its place in the grand scheme of things, just like the beach is a meeting place for the water, the land, and the sky. You can see some of the same influences in artists like Bonnard, who was also interested in capturing fleeting moments of beauty.