Waldsee Mit Zwei Akten 1917

Otto Mueller made this scene of a lake with two figures probably sometime in the 1920s with oil on canvas. Imagine those vertical strokes of blues and browns conjuring trees and foliage. They must have felt so alive, so immediate, like the landscape was leaping onto the canvas. And those yellow figures! How they emerge, almost shyly, from the scene. I bet Mueller felt like he was right there, feeling the cool air, and the earth underfoot, and just letting it all flow through him. It makes me think about the German Expressionists, their desire to capture feeling more than accurate representation. But he also had his own thing going on, like a quieter, more intimate dialogue with nature. Painting is always a kind of conversation, isn't it? Between the artist and the world, between colors and forms, between then and now.