Svarta Diana 1929

Nils Dardel’s painting is a menagerie of animals rendered in thin washes of color, creating a vision that feels both primitive and exotic. I can just imagine the artist at work, playfully arranging this Eden of rhinos, giraffes, monkeys, and big golden eagles. What a dream! It looks like Dardel might have been thinking about Henri Rousseau, with his flat planes of color and naive perspective. I imagine he was trying to create a similar sense of wonder and enchantment. The painting is all surface and symbol. The animals are not quite realistic, but they still evoke a sense of the wild. Take the striped zebra, for example. It stands with an awkwardness that is utterly charming. Dardel, Rousseau, and a whole host of artists continue a conversation about what it means to represent the world. Painting gives us such different ways of seeing, thinking, and feeling. It's a way to explore the ambiguities of life, where fixed meanings dissolve and endless interpretations take their place.