The figure was that of an Eastern girl, slight and supple, and
possessing a devilish and forbidding grace. Her short hair formed a
black smudge upon the canvas, and cast a dense shadow upon her face.
The composition was infinitely daring; for out of this shadow shone the
great black eyes, their diablerie most cunningly insinuated; whilst with
a brilliant exclusion of detail--by means of two strokes of the brush
steeped in brightest vermilion, and one seemingly haphazard splash of
dead white--an evil and abandoned smile was made to greet the spectator.
To the waist, the figure was a study in satin nudity, whence, from a
jeweled girdle, light draperies swept downward, covering the feet and
swinging, a shimmering curve out into the foreground of the canvas, the
curve being cut off in its apogee by the gold frame.
Above her head, this girl of demoniacal beauty held a bunch of poppies
seemingly torn from the vase: this, with her left hand; with her right
she pointed, tauntingly, at her beholder.
In comparison with the effected futurism of the other pictures in the
studio, "Our Lady of the Poppies," beyond question was a great painting.
From a point where the entire composition might be taken in by the eye,
the uncanny scene glowed with highly colored detail; but, exclude the
scheme of the composition, and focus the eye upon any one item--the
golden dragon--the seated Chinaman--the ebony door--the silk-shaded
lamp; it had no detail whatever: one beheld a meaningless mass of
colors.
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