Machine with Red Square 1926

Willi Baumeister made this painting called, *Machine with Red Square*, and right away, I imagine him layering those shades of gray, taupe, and cream. I think about how each form must have emerged slowly, a dialogue between intuition and precision. The painting’s surface is smooth, its edges sharp, and the colors quiet, but look at that red square! It's such a bold gesture amid all those muted tones. It pops so much you almost feel that it could break loose from the canvas. I wonder if Baumeister placed it there to disrupt the cool order. When I look at this, I think of the Bauhaus and other painters such as Fernand Leger, and the way that artists in that era were trying to make sense of a rapidly changing world, and the new relationship between humans and machines. It’s almost as if he’s saying painting *is* a kind of machine. It takes you somewhere.