Personnages 1982

Grégoire Michonze seems to have painted this panel with oils in one sitting, maybe even in a single afternoon. Look closely at the artist's open brushstrokes, and how the ochres, browns, greys, and blacks have been applied wet into wet. The texture is smooth and opaque, but the overall effect is rich and sensuous. The surface is built up from many thin layers of paint, and there's a real immediacy in the handling of the paint. The bare feet and turned heads give these figures a frenzied almost biblical air. Each brushstroke captures the light, giving the figures a real sense of vitality. Michonze has been compared to Rouault and Soutine in the past, but to me the composition recalls the work of Fernand Leger. All these artists use a restricted palette, and work in a figurative style, but Michonze's work feels less studied and more naive. Michonze may not be a household name, but like his older contemporaries, he understood that art is an ongoing conversation, and that ambiguity is part of the process.