The card game

Mediums: oil, canvas.
Location: The Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum, Madrid (Spain).

A speciality of Balthus’ paintings is the peculiar use of oil technology in such a way that the appearance of the fresco painting is created. If you abandon the plot of the large, almost two-meter canvas (children playing cards), you can imagine that you are looking at a medieval fresco. The large planar and marked with almost local colour details are distinct. At the same time, the author’s ability to give the composition an atmosphere of mystery and tension in the most innocent plot remains characteristic and unchanged.