Funeral of a painter’s apprentice 1911

Jacek Malczewski painted 'Funeral of a Painter's Apprentice' in subdued browns, greens, and blues, with an enigmatic symbolic charge. I imagine the painting emerging through layers of thought, feeling, and maybe even a little bit of doubt, stroke by stroke. Look closely at the brushwork. See how the ochre paint is dabbed and dragged across the canvas. I’m thinking about Malczewski, alone in his studio, wrestling with this scene. What does it mean to bury the tools of art? What does it mean to follow in the footsteps of those who came before? What does it mean to face your mortality as an artist? Perhaps he, too, felt like an apprentice sometimes, humbled by the weight of art history. Painting is such a funny thing. It's an exchange across time. We stand on each other's shoulders, borrowing, stealing, and transforming what we find. We embrace the ambiguity, the not-knowing, because that’s where the good stuff lies.