Unheard of Meeting 1942

Cyprián Majerník made this painting, Unheard of Meeting, with delicate marks, in shades of brown, pink, and white. Just looking at it, I can almost see the brush moving, feel the give and take between intention and accident, as the artist builds up the figures and their surroundings. I wonder what Majerník was thinking about while he was creating this image? What he wanted to capture? Did he know what the final painting would look like or did it emerge gradually, through a process of questioning and discovery? There’s something compelling in the way the figures come into being from a collection of fluid marks. See how the strokes vary in direction and thickness, some more defined, others more blurry or pale. They lend a sense of movement, a feeling of being caught in the midst of a moment in time. Painters are always talking to one another across time, and I see echoes of Daumier and Delacroix in Majerník’s painting. Artists build on what’s come before, reinterpreting the past with a contemporary sensibility. The beauty of painting is its capacity to embrace ambiguity, to suggest multiple possibilities and interpretations.