Profile 

Odilon Redon painted "Profile" with oils in the late 19th or early 20th century, and it's now held in a private collection. The traditional medium gives a rich texture that enhances the dreamlike quality of the image, with a dark silhouette of a head next to brightly colored, stylized flowers. Redon was not part of the establishment, and he embraced unorthodox materials like charcoal and pastels because they didn't have the same established, academic connotations as oil paint. The way the paint is built up here creates a tactile surface, almost blurring the line between painting and sculpture. You can see the hand of the artist in the thick impasto and loose brushwork. Looking at a painting like this, we can appreciate how materials and making processes contribute to an artwork's full meaning, going beyond traditional boundaries between art and craft.