Charcoal studies
“One day I was painting, and black had invaded the entire surface of the canvas, with no shapes, no contrasts, no transparency.
In this extreme I saw a kind of negation of black.
Differences in texture reflect light to a greater or lesser extent, and from the dark emanated a clarity, a pictorial light, whose particular emotional power drove my desire to paint.
My instrument was no longer the dark, but this secret light coming from the dark.”
Pierre Soulages
