Lake Geneva in Chexbres 1911

Ferdinand Hodler painted this view of Lake Geneva from Chexbres, probably in oil on canvas. Imagine him standing there, brush in hand, trying to capture that muted, almost melancholic light. The paint looks thinly applied, almost like watercolor in places, giving it a dreamy, ethereal quality. The horizon line is a soft, hazy band of lavender and yellow, meeting the water in a gentle embrace. The foreground, with its sparse, bare trees, adds a touch of starkness, a reminder of the quiet stillness of the landscape. I wonder if Hodler felt a sense of isolation here, a connection to nature, or maybe just a painterly fascination with the way light transforms a scene. This painting reminds me of other landscape painters like Caspar David Friedrich, who also sought to capture the sublime in nature, but Hodler brings a uniquely Swiss sensibility to it. Painting is always about entering into a conversation with what’s come before, and making something new.