Green Grove 1990

Tetyana Yablonska made this painting, Green Grove, with what looks like oil on canvas, and you can almost feel the cool, dense air of the forest. I love how Yablonska's greens aren’t just green: they shimmer from a yellow-green to a blue-green haze. I can imagine the artist, brush in hand, trying to capture the sensation of being totally enveloped by the natural world. She piles the paint on, creating a thick, almost tactile surface, like the bark of a tree or a dense bush. And that one arching branch - you can see how she used her brush almost like she was sketching, to create the sinuous curve. It’s amazing how a single gesture can communicate so much about growth, movement, and change. This painting reminds me of other landscape painters who explore the sensory experience of nature. It's part of a long conversation between artists about how to represent the world around us. Painting is a form of expression that welcomes experimentation, and there are always more conversations to be had.