Constantinople 1910

Martiros Sarian painted this Constantinople with oils on canvas; a place that shimmers with a bright almost Fauvist palette of blues, greens and yellows. It must have been incredible to make this, standing in a busy marketplace, trying to capture the feel of it all. The dogs are lying down in the sun, taking it easy, the figures are dark, like shadows. I bet Sarian painted alla prima, wet on wet, laying down each stroke with immediacy. Look at the roofline, how it tilts and bends with a kind of expressionist force. He’s simplifying shapes, flattening the perspective, and turning it all into a kind of dream. Sarian was part of a generation of artists, like Matisse and Kandinsky, who were pushing the boundaries of representation and finding new ways to express inner states. The painting feels like a distillation of a place and a feeling; a moment caught in time, and rendered with real joy.