The Creation of Birds

Mediums: masonite, oil.
Location: private collection.

One of Varo’s most famous paintings is a wonderful allegory of creativity. In a mysterious alchemical laboratory, a young female bird creates winged things, which immediately fly out from an opened window. She depicted birds with paints that are put on the palette with the help of a strange device; to make birds look like real, she used sunlight through a special lens. The parallel between the main character and the artist herself is easily seen in this painting. The symbolic and slightly naive canvas evokes children’s guesses about the origin of all the things in the world and their secret creator.