La Parisienne (4) 1902

Jacques Villon made this print, La Parisienne (4), and it's interesting how he brings together these soft, almost faded colors – pinks, yellows, creams – to depict this woman in a chair. I wonder what it was like for him to try and capture her essence, her ‘Parisienne-ness,’ through these delicate marks and textures. It’s like he’s trying to catch a feeling, a fleeting moment of beauty and elegance. I love the way the colors kind of blend and bleed into each other. It makes you want to reach out and touch the surface. There’s a kind of quietness in this image, a stillness. Like she is lost in thought, or maybe just enjoying a moment of peace. It's like Villon is in conversation with other artists of his time, sharing ideas about how to see and represent the world. I'd like to think that he was trying to show us that beauty can be found in the everyday, in the ordinary moments of life. That’s what art can do, right? It can make us see the world in a new way, and maybe even help us to appreciate it a little bit more.