#1

Experience
This painting always seems to catch my eye every time I pass by the hallway due to its resemblance to Picasso. To me, the artist very obviously tried to reproduce the Picasso aesthetic. The painting is oil on canvas, presumably, and consists of a man and a woman embracing with a mostly white backdrop. The painting has a very thin shoddy-looking wooden frame, but it blends well with the wall color. There’s a 1-foot long light fixture right above providing ample lighting, enough to allow the painting to ‘stand-out’ when walking by.  The male figure seems to stare at the viewer with a very striking stare. The eye seems to be the only detailed, realistic-looking part of this abstract painting. The lighting brings more focus to faces of the figures. The expression of the woman is calm and indifferent. It seems as if the man grabbing her is absorbing her body into his.


Close
I usually stand relatively close to paintings and then step back to admire their entirety. For this particular painting, it was curious to notice that twice the artist signed it. I’m unsure of whether this was intentional or not. There’s also an area near the bottom that hasn’t been painted. I assumed that the artist had already painted on the canvas, but was unhappy with the result and decided to re-use it, this would account for the dark tones used in some areas of the painting. If this was so, I wonder why she/he didn’t just paint over the old signature. Another thing I noticed was the chaotic use of color at the intersection where the man meets with the woman. Perhaps to highlight the clash of feelings this interaction creates for the artist.


Analysis
I mainly used a stylistic and biographical approach when viewing this painting. I connected the style used to another artist. Additionally, I used contextual analysis trying to determine why the painting was signed twice. Some formal analysis was used, but I don’t think I’m knowledgeable enough to make concrete claims in that area.