Sunset

"Sunset" is a watercolour work where Konstantin Chaykin translates nature into the language of a watch movement. Depicting a sunset landscape through the optics of Haute Horlogerie, the artist conveys the idea that the change of day and night is governed by the same logic as the running of any calibre. A small gear with twelve teeth takes the place of the sun, while in another, larger wheel half-submerged in water, one can recognise both the horizon line and a component of the movement. The position of the sun-gear on the horizon line corresponds to the only geometrically possible point of their contact, so that the sunset ceases to be a metaphor and becomes a fixed technical state of the mechanism.

The composition is built on the contrast between the ochre palette the artist uses to paint the sky and the cold blue-green tone of the water. A vertical path of light leading from the sun towards the viewer emphasises the axis of symmetry of the sheet. Through these devices, Konstantin Chaykin succeeds in capturing a moment in which day and night meet with the same contrast as the teeth of the wheels of a watch movement.