Madonna 1937

Bela Czobel created this Madonna with what looks like generous strokes of oil paint. I wonder what it might have been like to paint this. Maybe Czobel was trying to catch something fleeting. The colours are all earthy— browns and reds—and the paint looks quite thick, especially around the face. You can see how the brush has moved, almost like he was sculpting with the paint. It’s like he’s not just painting a picture, but trying to get at something deeper, maybe something about the human condition itself. This painting reminds me of some of Rouault's portraits—they have that same kind of intensity and emotional charge. It feels like artists are having a conversation across time, picking up on each other's ideas and pushing them further. And that’s what’s so great about painting—it embraces uncertainty, allowing for multiple meanings and interpretations.