Portrait of a Woman 1917

Robert Falk painted this portrait of a woman with oils, but exactly when, we don’t know. The whole picture is built up from a patchwork of brushstrokes that create texture and volume. I can imagine Falk carefully placing each stroke, stepping back, and then moving forward to add another. The colours, blues, browns, greens, and yellows are earthy. Her face is pale, and the bold placement of the rouge on her cheeks is very striking. You wonder what Falk and the sitter were thinking. Maybe they chatted about other painters, like Cézanne, who also built up volume through colour. The painting feels a bit like a conversation, doesn’t it? Artists through time are constantly exchanging ideas, whether they know it or not. For me, painting is like embodied expression, it embraces uncertainty. There’s no one way to read it.