Fox 1918

Niko Pirosmani made this painting of a fox on oilcloth, and it’s a great example of how raw and direct painting can be. Look at the way he’s mixed color. The fox has this great, russet-y brown, but it's not blended or fussy. It’s just laid down next to the creamy whites and blacks, each doing their job, right? The surface has this great, slightly bumpy texture, almost like it’s aged, which gives it a real earthy feel. I keep coming back to those eyes: they are so simply rendered with a dark, almost black outline and a simple, large dot of colour within. The eyes really do make the animal. Pirosmani reminds me a lot of Henri Rousseau; there's that same kind of self-taught, visionary thing happening. Both were definitely onto something about how much you can say with a little. There's a conversation here about simplicity versus complexity. Which is better? Who knows!