Field Flowers 1987

Constantin Piliuta made this painting of flowers in vases sometime in the 80s, judging by the signature. It’s fascinating how Piliuta’s brushwork gives these blooms a life of their own. The orange petals, kind of spiky, are like sunbursts, right? They look like they're made up of repeated, simple gestures of the brush. There’s this tension between the flatness of the painting and the implied volume of the vases, echoed in the contrast between the soft green of the leaves and the vibrant orange of the flowers. There’s something naive about the whole scene, a kind of unstudied approach that reminds me of Milton Avery’s simplified forms. But unlike Avery, Piliuta seems less concerned with color relationships and more with the raw, expressive potential of paint. The painting feels like a direct record of the artist’s encounter with the subject, immediate and full of feeling.