‘I and the village’ by Chagall

Last week’s post ended up a bit heavier, both in size and content, than I intend most posts to be so I thought this week’s should be short.

Recently, I visited the exhibition of Marc Chagall’s paintings at the Tate Liverpool and was particular inspired by ‘I and the Village’, which was painted in Paris in 1911 although Chagall was born in a small village in Belarus.  Apparently, the painting signifies the interconnectivity of human life and the surrounding natural world – notice the fine line connecting the eyes of the peasant and the animal also the peasant holding a sprig of a tree.  The orbits of the earth and moon are suggested by the circular shapes in the painting, which perhaps also represent the cyclical nature of life.

As you might guess from my posts over the last year, these ideas resonant with my own approach to our interaction with the earth and the natural resources available to us.  I like the layers of connections and interacting activities illustrated in the painting, including many that are not immediately obvious, just as in life.

The painting is part of the collection of the MoMA in New York [http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=78984] but is part of the Chagall: Modern Master Exhibition at the Tate Liverpool until October 6th, 2013 [http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-liverpool/exhibition/chagall-modern-master] for which it is their poster picture.  Either website will give you a better picture than the thumbnail above, or you could go and see it in person…