Landscapist Props 1940

Vasile Popescu made this painting, Landscapist Props, with oils, and it feels like an intimate, yet slightly clumsy, conversation between the artist and his tools. There's this suitcase, probably beat up, acting as a makeshift table. And atop it, a chaotic arrangement of painterly necessities: tubes of color spilling out of a box, like unruly thoughts escaping the mind. It’s all rendered in these warm, earthy tones, ochres and browns, which make me think of Cezanne, and a certain kind of solid, material vision. I can imagine Popescu wrestling with the composition, pushing the paint around, trying to capture that fleeting moment when objects start to sing together. Is that a rag, or some kind of cloth? I can almost feel the weight of the paint as he applies each stroke, each dab a decision, a negotiation with the canvas. It’s this very human struggle that draws me in, this imperfect dance between intention and execution.