House Manhufe 1910

Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso’s ‘House Manhufe’ is like a Fauvist daydream, all painted with these really juicy strokes of color – greens, oranges, blues – that just make you wanna dive right in. I imagine Amadeo standing there, squinting in the sun, trying to wrangle the light and the shapes into some kind of harmony. Look at the way he’s built up the paint, thick in some spots, almost scrubbed away in others. I bet he was really feeling it, pushing and pulling, adding and subtracting, trying to get that feeling of the place just right. The way the colors bump up against each other – that deep blue shadow next to the sun-baked ochre – it's like he's making a little map of his own experience. You know, painting isn’t just about what things look like, it’s about how they feel. Amadeo’s not just showing us a house, he’s showing us a world, a way of seeing. And isn't that what art is all about?