Rue Gauguet by Nicolas Staël

The image above is a picture of Nicolas Staël's painting Rue Gauguet. Named after the street the artist's studio was on. One of the most important things to keep in mind while looking at this image above is that the original painting is much larger, 78 1/2 x 94 5/8 inches. Painted by the Russian artist in France. This painting is oil paint on wood panel and was painted in 1949.

This work is one of my favorites because it leaves the viewer with more questions after seeing it then it answers. What is it's subject? What is this piece telling me?

While looking at this work I was thinking about McCloud's idea of Realism to Abstraction and this work falls heavily on the Abstraction side. There are no elements in the work that resemble anything of the world outside of this painting. Another thing that is not as apparent in the image above is the amount of thick layers of manipulated paint there are on this surface. The most interesting part about looking at this painting for me was getting up close to see the textures and different tones and colors buried under the surface and in the separations between sections of color.