A Man in the World 1925

Pavel Filonov made "A Man in the World" with oil on canvas. The geometric shapes, mostly triangles, and a palette of blues, reds, and whites, suggest an artist wrestling with how we see and know things. I think he was interested in the inner and outer worlds. The planes of color, which dissect these faces, push against each other. Forms are emerging through some kind of struggle. There are so many faces that are caught in the net of geometric forms, where the paint is both thinly applied and also textured, giving it all a real push and pull. This reminds me a little of Picasso, and how he tried to show all sides of a face at once. But here, Filonov is trying to show all sides of a person’s experience. Artists are always looking at each other and trying to figure out what it means to be human. Each gesture here opens to multiple readings, it never comes down to one single story.