The little station 1911

Natalia Goncharova’s "The little station" is a painting seemingly constructed from shards of color and light. It feels like Goncharova wasn't trying to capture a station, but rather the *idea* of a station. A feeling of constant movement and a place of constant change. Look at the way she’s layered the blues and blacks; it’s all about the materiality of paint, its thickness and thinness playing tricks on your eyes. The confident strokes of black that form the skeletal architecture of the station are so bold, so upfront. These marks suggest a kind of raw energy, and the almost nonchalant way they overlap with the blues creates this feeling of depth, of layers upon layers of lived experience. The orange number ‘2’ is so bright it almost vibrates against the darkness around it. Goncharova reminds me a little of Umberto Boccioni, who also wanted to capture the dynamism of modern life on canvas. Ultimately, it's not about what it means, but about what it *feels* like. And in that sense, it’s always moving.