Landscape, New Mexico 1919 - 1920

Marsden Hartley made this painting of a New Mexico landscape, probably with oil on canvas. What I see is a process of call and response, a conversation between the artist and the land. The mountains are evoked with a broad stroke of blue, but it’s the rocks that really hold my attention. Look at the big, bulbous boulders in the foreground. Hartley uses thick, juicy strokes of earthy browns and greens, each dab a little different from the last, building up a tapestry of texture. It's like he's sculpting with paint, trying to capture the weight and solidity of the stone. See how the light catches on the edges of each stroke? It's almost like you could reach out and touch them. Hartley reminds me of Cezanne, and the way he used paint to build up form and space. This landscape is not just a picture, it's a physical thing, an object in itself.