Lamp 1916

Juan Gris made this 'Lamp' painting with what looks like charcoal and crayon, maybe gouache, and lots of playful patterning. I’m thinking about the lamp as a head, and wondering, did Gris read by lamplight, or was he just arranging shapes? Look at how he’s made a book out of planes, with all those triangles, rectangles, and a few biomorphic curves. It’s almost as if he made a collage and then drew over the top of it. I can imagine him shuffling forms, trying different angles, different color combinations. Those varied grounds are incredible, like the black and tan with white dots, and the heavy black. Look how the orange of the lamp base hums against the brown of the table, or the green of the lampshade against the dotted ground. It's like he's in a visual conversation with Braque or Picasso, but with his own special color sense. They were all working in a kind of call and response, egging each other on!