Paysage près de Méréville 1905

Maximilien Luce made 'Landscape near Méréville’ with oil on cardboard, and it’s like stepping into a breezy, sun-drenched day. Look at those creamy strokes of sky blue, and how they mingle with the fluffy whites of the clouds. I imagine Luce, out in the fields, squinting at the landscape and trying to capture the light as it flickers across the trees. Those short, choppy strokes in the foreground give a sense of movement, almost as if the wind is rustling through the grass. You can almost feel the texture of the bark of the trees, thick and knotted. And that lone tree standing tall against the sky, feels like a portrait of resilience. Luce seems to be in conversation with other painters, like Pissarro and the other Impressionists. They were all trying to get at something fleeting and real, something beyond just the surface of things. Painting is like that, always reaching, always questioning, always changing.