Beim Malen (wohl Marianne von Werefkin) 1911

Gabriele Münter made this painting, "Beim Malen," probably of Marianne von Werefkin, with bold colors and thick, confident strokes, capturing a moment of artistic creation. It feels like an act of painting about painting. I really get into the materiality of this piece; the way the colors are laid down so directly and flatly. It's honest in its surface. You can practically feel the texture of the paint, thick and opaque, especially in the yellow background, applied with a visible brushstroke. This contrasts with the more subtle blending in the face of the woman, which gives her a soft, almost ethereal quality. Look at the woman’s palette: each dab of color is a world of its own, a promise of the potential held within each pigment. There’s a clear connection here to the work of other early expressionists. You might find a kindred spirit in the work of Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, particularly in the way he used color to express inner states and emotions. Like their paintings, this piece stands as a testament to the power of art to capture not just what we see, but how we feel.