Bay of Islands 1930

Franklin Carmichael made this painting, Bay of Islands, with oil on canvas. Look at the way he’s arranged the land and water to create this geometric space. It feels like a theatrical stage set, but with all that light and air, too. I imagine Carmichael must have been thinking about form, how to construct a scene with simple shapes and subtle color shifts. He probably looked at Cézanne, at those stacked planes and muted tones, and thought, "Yeah, I can do something like that with my own backyard." What’s cool is the balance between observation and invention. He's clearly depicting a real place but pushing it toward abstraction. It's a dance between seeing and feeling, like he is not just copying nature but trying to capture its essence. And that's what makes it more than just a pretty landscape. It’s a whole world, conjured up by a painter who knew how to look.