Staten Island 1927

Arshile Gorky painted this piece, Staten Island, probably in oil on canvas, and it feels like a real investigation into seeing. The forms emerge tentatively through colour, like he’s feeling his way through the scene. I love how the paint is laid down in these chunky, rectangular marks. You can practically see his brushstrokes building up the composition. The texture gives everything a kind of vibrating energy, which stops it from being too picturesque. Look at the way the green trees in the mid-ground become these almost electric, pulsing forms. The colour is rich and juicy! These little, broken touches of blue, green, and yellow, somehow conjure up the feeling of leaves rustling in the breeze. For me, this prefigures some of his later, more abstract landscapes. There's a similar attention to the push and pull of colour and form. It reminds me a little of Cezanne. It’s like Gorky's wrestling with perception, turning it into something solid and alive.