Cubist Still Life 1956

Nuri Iyem made this Cubist Still Life with oil paint. Look how the painting has come into being through a kind of trial and error, shifting and emerging through intuition. I love to imagine Iyem, brush in hand, stepping back, squinting, and then leaning in again to make those angular marks. There's a real tension between the flat planes of color and the suggestion of three-dimensional objects. The paint is applied in these decisive blocks, but it’s still thin enough that we can sense the surface beneath. And that color palette! The muted yellows, grays, and blacks create a kind of understated drama that feels very personal. It feels like Iyem, a conversation between what he’s seeing, and what he is feeling about what he is seeing. In painting we are always in conversation. It's an ongoing exchange of ideas across time, inspiring one another’s creativity. It is a form of expression that embraces ambiguity, allowing for multiple interpretations.