A Tree near Dniester River 1972

Margit Selska’s painting, A Tree near Dniester River, presents a landscape mediated through modernist aesthetics. The painting’s composition is anchored by the tree, its trunk boldly rendered with thick impasto and a warm, earthy palette that contrasts with the cooler blues and greens of the surrounding landscape. Selska destabilizes conventional landscape painting through her use of colour and form. The river, for instance, is not a naturalistic depiction but an arrangement of pink hues framed by geometric shapes. This abstraction moves away from mimesis to a focus on the intrinsic qualities of paint and texture, asking us to consider the painting as a constructed surface rather than a window onto the world. The semiotic implications of such formal choices are significant. Selska engages with the modernist project of dismantling traditional modes of representation. The painting challenges viewers to look beyond the subject matter and to engage with the materiality of the artwork itself.