Table 1922

Andre Derain made this painting, Table, with oil paint. He's clearly got this idea of art-making as a process in his head, building up the image with these carefully placed marks and a limited but effective palette. The material aspects are really singing here; the texture, the color, the surface. It’s not just what’s depicted, but the very physicality of the medium. You can see it, right? The paint isn’t super thick, but it’s not trying to hide anything either. Look at the way the light catches the edge of that pitcher, or the dark shadow cast by the mandolin. It's all about how Derain lets the paint do its thing. I see shades of Cezanne here, in the way he’s wrestling with form and space. But Derain is doing his own thing, pushing further into a Fauvist color field. It’s all part of this ongoing conversation artists have, bouncing ideas off each other across time. And, like any good conversation, it leaves plenty of room for ambiguity and open interpretations.