Five Nudes 1950

Sanyu painted ‘Five Nudes’ with oil on canvas in no particular year, using a palette of subdued pinks, yellows, and creams. The background has a cool, maroon-purple color that feels very of-the-moment. I love how he's playing with the materiality of paint here; you can almost feel the surface. The paint is thin, like the consistency of watercolor, which allows Sanyu to build up these translucent layers. There’s this figure to the right, with a hand on her hip; the dark line that traces around her is almost a shadow, giving the figure an illusion of depth against the maroon background. The work reminds me of Matisse, who also uses simplified forms and bold colors, but there’s something distinctly Sanyu in the way he flattens and elongates the figures. This painting isn’t trying to say one thing, but maybe it leaves you thinking about bodies, colors, or even painting itself.