Fleurs Sur Fond Gris 1916

Odilon Redon made *Fleurs Sur Fond Gris* using pastel, a medium that sits between drawing and painting. Ground pigments are bound into sticks and applied directly to the paper, a process more spontaneous than building up layers of oil paint. Pastel has a matte, powdery quality; you can almost feel the chalky texture on the paper. Redon coaxes a remarkable luminosity from the medium, juxtaposing strokes of pure pigment to create a shimmering effect. While trained in academic art practices, Redon embraced the expressive possibilities of color, favoring imagination over strict representation. In doing so, he allied himself with the Symbolist movement, which valued subjective experience. The immediacy of pastel allowed Redon to capture the fleeting beauty of flowers, a subject traditionally associated with decorative arts and craft. This blurring of boundaries challenges traditional distinctions between artistic disciplines, emphasizing the importance of both material and imagination in unlocking an artwork's deeper meanings.