Sketch for Mosaique 1960

Alla Horska made this vibrant watercolour sketch, called ‘Sketch for Mosaique’, with layers of translucent colour, allowing shapes to emerge and shift organically. It reminds me of when I’m working on a painting. I start with a feeling and let the colours and forms evolve, guiding them into a composition that feels both surprising and inevitable. You can see the hand of the artist in the fluidity of the marks. There's a real intimacy to the work, like you’re seeing right into her creative thought process. The shapes are not quite representational. Some look almost floral, others are more abstract, but it has a feeling of a garden or a hidden world. It is like looking through a kaleidoscope of colours and forms. Looking at the patterns, there are some repeating motifs which really jump out. It is so interesting to think of how her work relates to other modernist painters in Ukraine and beyond. Like, how did those ideas bounce around in her head, and how did she make them her own? It makes you wonder how much we’re all in conversation with each other, riffing on the same themes. I’m sure she’s influencing artists today.