Portrait of two girls 1933

Rafael Zabaleta made this portrait of two girls with oil on canvas. The ochre background and the subdued greens and whites of the figures are very grounded, but then there is a shadow behind them in a bright Matisse-like blue, which really pops. I wonder if Zabaleta set out to capture their likeness, or perhaps he was more interested in the act of painting itself? Maybe he began with a careful outline, only to abandon it later, layering and scraping until the image emerged. Like a sculptor, he may have chiseled away at the paint, revealing the composition beneath. Look at the girl on the right sitting on the chair. She’s holding a tiny yellow flower. What was going through his mind when he painted that detail? To me, it’s these small gestures that make a painting come alive, connecting Zabaleta’s vision to our own experiences and emotions. These kinds of paintings speak to the ongoing exchange of ideas between artists across time, constantly inspiring one another's creativity. It makes you think about painting as a form of embodied expression which embraces ambiguity, allowing for endless interpretations.