Untitled 1939

Picasso painted this untitled oil on canvas in 1939, and you can see the furious energy in the brushstrokes. It's like he's wrestling with the image, trying to pin it down but letting the process remain visible. The color palette is intense – that almost metallic blue for the head against the backdrop of gold and green feels dissonant. You can see the texture of the paint, thick in places, especially around the eyes, as if Picasso was building up the layers of his perception, the physicality of the medium mirroring the emotional weight. The way he renders the eyes, staring out with this strange, detached gaze, it’s so unsettling. This reminds me of some of Francis Picabia's more figurative portraits, where the subject seems to be falling apart, but held together by the sheer force of the painter's will. It’s a reminder that art doesn’t have to resolve itself neatly.