The Cat and the Rooster (Le chat et le coq) from Aesop's Fable (Fables d'Ésope) 1946

Pierre Alechinsky made this strange little painting called ‘The Cat and the Rooster’ in 1946. Look at the way the shapes are outlined with these scratchy lines, and filled in with bright, almost acidic, yellows and blues. It’s a playful, almost childlike approach to process that draws you right in. The physicality of the materials is really present. You can almost feel the way the paint was dragged across the surface, leaving behind these subtle textures. And then there’s that cat's face, all sharp teeth and staring eyes. It’s a bit unnerving, but also kind of funny. It reminds me a bit of some of Joan Miró’s more whimsical paintings, where figures and objects morph into something both familiar and totally bizarre. Ultimately, this piece invites us to embrace ambiguity and find our own meaning within it. Art’s not about answers, it’s about the questions we ask along the way.