A Clown 1929

George Luks painted this clown with oil on canvas, and the making of this picture is front and center. It's all about the brushstrokes and how they land. There’s a real push-pull with the textures in this painting, like the smeary white makeup on the clown's face, contrasted against the velvety dark blue of his smock. The clown's mouth is painted with a gaudy slick of blue, giving an almost monstrous dimension to the piece. I love how that single daisy seems out of place, a delicate touch in a scene of bold strokes. He’s not quite like Ensor, but Luks also reminds us that with paint we can make the familiar strange, and the strange familiar. Art’s a conversation, after all, full of echoes and whispers across time.