"There is no china painting, no glass painting, no tempera, no oil, wax, varnish, or twenty-chimney-power-extract-of-everything painting which can compare with the quiet and tender virtue of water colour in its proper use and place. There is nothing that obeys the artist's hand so exquisitely; nothing that records the subtlest pleasures of sight so perfectly. All the splendours of the prism and the jewel are vulgar and few compared to the subdued blending of infinite opalescence in finely-inlaid water colour; and the repose of light obtainable by its transparent tints, and absolutely right forms to be rendered by practiced use of its opaque ones, are beyond rivalship, even by the most skillful methods in other media."
- John Ruskin, Letter to the Times, April 14, 1886, reprinted in A Descriptive Handbook of Modern Water Colour Pigments, Winsor & Newton, 1887)
I am enjoying working on my little water color paintings these past few weeks, even the failures. Applying myself to a few specific concepts and staying within fairly limited means is yielding some positive results. Water color on a small scale with a minimal palette, of specific subject matter --- either basic still lifes for my Ordinary Objects series (see last month's posting for more on that) or the ever present landscape. Unavoidable circumstances I first saw as restrictions are providing limitations that I needed to come up against so I could get my bearings. Within these circumscribed boundaries is a freedom I was missing in all the endless choices that are otherwise available.
[Landscape: Brooklyn & New Jersey. water color on paper. 7 x 5".]
