Red Landscape 1948

Willi Baumeister made this painting, Red Landscape, with oil, though when, I'm not sure. See how he’s built up the paint in these crusty, textural strokes? It's like he's thinking about the landscape, not as something you look at, but something you make. Like baking bread, or building a stone wall. Now, check out that little yellow diamond shape with the single eye. It's like a tiny alien peering out from this abstract world. And the way it sits slightly off-center, almost floating, it throws the whole composition into this beautiful, unstable balance. Baumeister's work reminds me of Paul Klee, in the way he balances playfulness with a deep understanding of form and color. Both artists invite us to see the world anew, not as a fixed reality, but as a field of endless possibilities.