Flowers at night 1942

Kateryna Bilokur made this painting, Flowers at Night, using a really fine brush and a dark palette. I can just imagine her outside at night, in a thick garden, carefully looking at each flower, trying to capture how it feels to be in that garden. It’s a wild space where flowers, leaves, and maybe a bird are suspended in the darkness. She’s built up the image with thousands of tiny marks – I bet she had to really concentrate! I can feel the air, smell the flowers, and hear the quiet sounds of the night in this painting. Bilokur's work reminds me of Henri Rousseau, who painted his own imagined jungles. Both artists see nature as this abundant, almost magical space. Painting is like that too – you put one color down, and another, and suddenly a whole world appears. It’s like you’re building a place you can wander around in.