Composition 1923

David Kakabadzé made this painting, called Composition, with oil paint. It is currently held in a private collection. I can really get a sense of the painting's history, the many layers of coloured shapes coming into form, adjusting, and then solidifying into the final image. The colour palette of muted reds, greens, purples, and greys is strangely alluring, the smooth shapes seem to reference natural forms, but somehow feel symbolic. I wonder what Kakabadzé was thinking about when he made it? There is an ease in the way that the colours sit next to each other, the muted, almost chalky quality of the paint adding a unique texture to the surface. Looking at the way the orange-red shape abuts the darker background makes me think about how artists are in an ongoing conversation with each other, picking up on ideas that are already in circulation and then making them their own. Painting offers such a wonderful form of expression, it embraces ambiguity, leaving space for our own interpretation.