Boats at Martigues 1908

Raoul Dufy painted ‘Boats at Martigues’ on canvas using oil paint with a Fauvist colour palette. Dufy's brushstrokes are so immediate, you can almost feel the energy of his hand moving across the canvas. The paint isn’t blended, it’s laid on in these juicy marks, like he’s chasing after the light and trying to catch it right there on the surface. Look at the lower boats. See how the colour seems to leak from the edges? It's like he’s saying, hey, this is paint, this is how I see the world, not how it *is*. The way he uses colour feels so intuitive, almost like he's improvising. But there's a structure, like a musical score. You see echoes of Matisse, but with a kind of joyful looseness that feels totally Dufy. Art isn't about perfection; it's about being in the moment and letting the paint sing.