Stone maiden (Still life) 1908

Natalia Goncharova made this painting, Stone Maiden (Still Life), with oil on canvas, and the way she builds up the forms feels so intuitive, like a process of feeling her way through the image. Look at the texture! The paint is thick in places, especially around the figure, giving a sculptural quality. The blues and browns create this muted, earthy palette, but there is a vibrancy nonetheless, a sort of quiet energy. I'm drawn to the way she renders the vase with the flower behind the figure, it looks like a collection of brushes with paint on the tips. The dark lines around the vase make it seem like it's glowing, and it brings a kind of spiritual aura. I’m reminded of Marsden Hartley, who also had a way of imbuing still life with a kind of symbolic and emotional weight. What I love most is that Goncharova embraces ambiguity, so the painting seems to shift and change as you look at it.