Saint Palais c. 1909

Armand Guillaumin’s Saint Palais, is a sensory explosion of color laid down with what looks like joyful abandon. I love the way he's not afraid to mix it up, throwing in unexpected hues that make the whole scene vibrate. The paint is thick, almost sculptural in places, especially in the foliage. You can practically feel the texture of the leaves. Look at that dazzling passage of blues, greens, and purples in the tree on the right – it’s like he's captured the very essence of dappled sunlight. The way he builds up the layers, it’s clear that for Guillaumin, painting wasn’t just about representation; it was about the process of applying paint to canvas, of building up the image through touch and gesture. Guillaumin reminds me of the later work of Camille Pissarro, there's a shared interest in the everyday, a similar embrace of the messy, unpredictable nature of paint. Art, after all, is an ongoing conversation, a constant exchange of ideas across time.