Mourning 1910

This painting, Mourning, by Umberto Boccioni, is a shadowy scene of heavy brushstrokes and dark emotion. The figures look like they’re dissolving into each other, haunted by the weight of loss, punctuated by the bright bouquets. I think about the actual stuff, the materiality of the paint, the thick, almost sculptural quality he coaxes out of the pigment. The way he layers colors, building up a surface that’s both dense and luminous. The color is used to build form, but also to express feeling. Look at the way Boccioni uses strokes of red, maybe anger, or perhaps to signify pain. Those strokes seem to vibrate with an energy that’s both disturbing and compelling, but is that the intent? Painting is a conversation that never really ends. Artists borrow, steal, and riff off each other across time, creating a lineage of visual thought that evolves and mutates with each new generation. So, it comes down to the feeling, which is unique.