The painting of chapel of St. Anastasia 1913

Nicholas Roerich painted this fresco in the Chapel of St. Anastasia, and just imagine him up there on scaffolding, with a brush full of ochre, painting these sweeping shapes! Roerich worked with a muted palette of blues, creams and browns and the paint is thin allowing the bare surface to breathe through. There's a real tenderness to the face at the center of the composition, and the shapes are very simplified. It reminds me of folk art—like the kind of direct, handmade imagery you see in all sorts of cultures. You can sense him trying to make something ethereal out of something very earthly. And that is what painters have always done, responding to each other across generations. It's all about exchange, interpretation, and being in dialogue. It's never just one fixed idea, it is an opening up.