Mountain 1946

Alekos Kontopoulos made this painting of a mountain, it looks like with oil paint. The colors are muted, kind of like a rainy day, and the brushstrokes are really loose and expressive, like he was trying to capture a feeling more than a picture. It's very process based, you can see all the working in the paint itself. I love how the surface is built up, thick in some spots and thin in others, so you can almost feel the texture of the cloth and the rough ground they are walking on. Especially the red coat that the woman in the foreground is wearing; it’s not just red, it's got all these other colors mixed in, like he was searching for the right shade. That coat looks a little like the one Van Gogh painted on the Roulin family, and it does so much to describe who the woman is. Ultimately, it’s a very human painting, full of life and struggle and a really beautiful example of how art can embrace all sorts of feelings at once.