Naturstudie L 1924

Karl Wiener's "Naturstudie L" seems to have emerged spontaneously through washes of watercolor. I can imagine him outside, maybe with a small folding chair, trying to capture a quick impression of the landscape. The grey clouds sort of brood over the green hills with their little red-roofed houses. There’s something really immediate and kind of humble about it. He’s not trying to be flashy, just present. I imagine the paper getting a little soggy, the watercolours bleeding into each other, and the light changing every few minutes. Painting outside can be like that, a race against time. The dark brushstrokes at the base of the painting create a foreground, giving the landscape depth and grounding it. It reminds me a bit of other landscape painters, like Cezanne, who were interested in capturing the feeling of being in a place, rather than just making a picture-perfect representation. Wiener’s really in that conversation, figuring out how to translate what he sees and feels onto paper, you know? It's not just about what you see but how you see it.