Les songes creux 1933

François Barraud painted Les songes creux with oil paint, and there’s a smooth, almost unreal quality, like a dream frozen in time. Look closely, and you can see the precision, the way the colors blend so seamlessly into each other. There’s a stillness in the color palette. See how the muted flesh tones contrast against the blue and red scarf? It’s all very controlled, very deliberate, but also, somehow, vulnerable. The surface is so smooth it almost disappears, but when you look at the edges you can see the brushstrokes. It's like Barraud wanted to hide his process. The rendering of the figure is incredibly detailed, so hyper-realistic it’s unsettling. It reminds me a little of Balthus, with that same sense of dreamy adolescence, but without all the weird undercurrents. Art’s always a conversation, right?