Cassis 1913

Pyotr Konchalovsky captured Cassis with oil on canvas in this 82 x 100 cm painting. The buildings in the background look like they’ve been built up in layers, like fondant on a cake. The colours are mixed like the light is flickering, everything vibrating in the heat. You can see that Pyotr is laying down these deliberate colour notes, that create such a specific light. I am imagining him working quickly, layering the paint—trying to capture the feeling of the place. There are these heavy impasto gestures in the foliage in the foreground that make the plants seem so alive. It feels like such a particular place, a perfect composition. The artist’s careful attention to the construction of a painting and the placement of colours is so evocative. This reminds me of Cézanne, how he, too, could make a painting that is both flat and spatial. He teaches us to really look.