Portal from the Abbey Church of Saint Laurent 1901

This painting of the Portal from the Abbey Church of Saint Laurent was made around 1901 by Camille Pissarro, probably in oil on canvas. What strikes me about this painting is the absolute trust Pissarro has in the process of artmaking. Look at those tiny dabs of paint, and how they build up to create the image of the church. It's like he's saying, "I don't need to know exactly what it looks like, I just need to start putting paint down." The colors are muted, almost gray, but there are flashes of red and green that give the painting life. And the texture is incredible, you can almost feel the roughness of the stone. The way the paint is applied, in these short, broken strokes, makes the whole scene shimmer and vibrate, I wonder if he thought about Cezanne's paintings while he was working on this. It's as if he is searching for something indefinable. And in a way, isn't that what art is all about?