Morocco 1912

Nicholas Roerich made this painting, Morocco, with thin layers of luminous colour, like a watercolour but with more body. I can imagine Roerich layering these semi-transparent hues, one over the other, building up a dreamlike vision of a landscape. Look at the way the lavender sky meets the peach-coloured earth. The colours aren’t quite blended, allowing a slight vibration along the horizon line. It’s as if the landscape shimmers and breathes, and maybe he was trying to capture that feeling. Roerich's work makes me think about Arthur Dove and his landscapes. Both Dove and Roerich were invested in distilling the essence of nature into simple forms and colours. They were part of a generation of artists who embraced abstraction as a means of expressing deeper, spiritual truths. Artists are always in dialogue with one another, riffing on ideas, and pushing the boundaries of what painting can do. Roerich embraces ambiguity, inviting us to bring our own experiences and interpretations to the canvas.