Tiberia 1935

Konstantin Gorbatov painted this view of Tiberia with oil on canvas, using short brushstrokes and a hazy palette. The way he’s applied the paint feels so immediate. You can almost feel him responding to the light as he worked. There’s a real materiality to the painting, a sort of all-overness that I love. Look at the mountain in the background, made with strokes of lavender, ochre, and white. It’s just delicious! It's the kind of painting where the subject and the paint become so connected. The tree is so evocative of the artist's state of mind, the way it droops and hangs. It's as if the tree is weeping. You can see echoes of Impressionism in Gorbatov's style, and maybe a little bit of someone like Camille Pissarro. Ultimately, though, he had his own unique vision and voice. Isn't it great how artists can take what came before and turn it into something completely their own?