In this 1891 painting September Evening, artist Maurice Denis seems to have equal regard for the forms of the actual world and abstraction. For instance, the female figures are recognizable as such but their faces are obscured, and they seem to be more part of a decorative aesthetic scheme rather than portraits or psychological studies. The running horses and woodland in the background are brilliantly, even supernaturally formed and colored. This points to a simplification of the objects of the world and a unifying vision of these objects.
Denis was the main theorist of the ‘Nabis’ movement that was involved in the transition from Impressionism towards more abstract art and movements like Symbolism, Fauvism, and Expressionism.
Maurice Denis’s September Evening is in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, France.