The singer L as Fioridigli 1923

Paul Klee dreamed up ‘The singer L as Fioridigli’ with watercolour and ink on paper. The earthy tones and free-flowing lines give her a mystical quality, like she’s emerged from a fairytale. I imagine Klee, maybe in his studio, a real alchemist mixing colours and ideas, making the invisible visible. Look at the singer’s hands lifting the edges of her hat; the gesture is so delicate, so precise, yet full of the weight of performance. It reminds me of the way Cy Twombly scrawled on his canvases, each line carrying a lifetime of emotion. Think about what Klee is doing in other works, how he’s always playing with symbols and signs, creating his own visual language. The way he uses colour to evoke mood, the way he simplifies forms to their essence. Artists, we're all magpies, picking up shiny bits of inspiration from each other, transforming them into something new. Painting is a conversation across time, each artist adding their voice to the chorus.