Two naked women and still life 1935

Andre Derain, sometime in the early 20th century, made this painting with oil on canvas, creating this sort of earthy, fleshy scene. Looking at those dark reds and browns, I wonder what Derain was thinking when he was layering the paint, building up the forms of these figures and the still life. The paint looks quite thin, almost like watercolor in places, which gives it a translucent quality. I feel like I can see the artist’s hand in the way he’s modeled those bodies, each stroke revealing something about his process. Those grapes have a sensuous feel to them, don’t they? You can see how he was pushing and pulling the paint around to find the right shape, the right color. I think about how Derain was inspired by the paintings of Paul Cezanne, and it reminds me that artists are always having a conversation with each other, across time, inspiring each other's creativity. Painting is embodied expression. We don’t need to fix meaning. It's about letting things emerge.