Portrait of Beatrice Hastings 1915

This is 'Portrait of Beatrice Hastings', painted by Amedeo Modigliani, but when? It's hard to say exactly, right? But he's working with oil paint, trying to figure out the shapes of faces. It's a process! Look at the way he layers the colours, especially around her cheeks. The paint's not too thick, but you can still see the brushstrokes, how he's building up the form. It’s like he’s sculpting with colour. See how the teal underlayer peeks through, giving her skin this otherworldly glow. It's not just about what she looks like, but the whole feeling of her presence, or her essence, somehow. Modigliani reminds me a bit of Egon Schiele, both trying to get at something beyond the surface. Both artists were interested in depicting people, but also, something about what it means to be a person. It's never a fixed thing, always changing and open to interpretation, isn't it?