Transcience 1912

Lajos Gulacsy created this dreamlike painting, called Transcience, with strokes of warm browns and creams that seem to blend into each other. The painting feels like a fading memory, doesn’t it? I imagine Gulacsy layering the paint, scraping it back, then adding more, trying to catch something that’s always slipping away. Look at how the figures seem to emerge from the shadows, their forms not quite defined. I wonder if Gulacsy felt like he was chasing ghosts, trying to hold onto fleeting moments and feelings. The paint is thin, washy, like a veil over the scene, adding to that sense of transience. That dripping fountain is so evocative; maybe Gulacsy was thinking of how life is always flowing, always changing. I can see echoes of other symbolist painters here, those who are also interested in the mysteries of the human soul, like Edvard Munch. Painting, like memory, is never fixed; it’s always evolving, speaking to us in different ways each time we look.