Joachim Homann: Looking at the portrait of Madame X, who was Madame Gautreau, a professional beauty in Paris of American birth, married to a banker, is a lot of fun. ![]() But it freed him from anecdotal content in his work and he realized at this moment that he was going to be an artist who was going to make a difference with his watercolors in the canon of art history. When this work was first exhibited in New York in a prestigious exhibition in 1881, it created a scandal because people did not know what Homer was trying to do. He’s brushing on the paint without filling every single spot so the sparkle, the shimmer of the water surface is really beautifully visible. What I find so special is Homer’s use of paper. The contrasts of the sunset on the harbor are very, very strong with almost an entirely black background set against the sunset and dark clouds hovering. What you see here is a use of color that is very bold. Joachim Homann: Winslow Homer had a breakthrough moment in 1880 when he rented a little home on an island in the Gloucester Harbor and he experimented with watercolor like no American artist before. “ American Watercolors, 1880-1990: Into the Light ” is on view in the University Galleries on Level 3 through Aug. Once the difficult choices were made, we recorded Homann, the Maida and George Abrams Curator of Drawings, musing on these and several other works from the show. There are Edward Hopper’s tributes to a less touristy side of Cape Cod John Singer Sargent’s take on a shoulder strap that so scandalized Paris, it drove him to London Richard Foster Yarde’s vibrant remembrance of a Roxbury apartment, which he set askew to convey the psychological tension within and in the exhibition’s earliest entry, precise renderings of daisies by Fidelia Bridges, the first American woman to earn her living through watercolor painting. Watercolorists on view range from the well-known, such as Winslow Homer, to the historically underrepresented - self-taught freedman Bill Traylor painted his featured portrait of a plowman and mule on the back of a cigarette advertisement. He’s having a hard time deciding which ones. ![]() The idea is that he’s going to informally chat about a few of the paintings, to provide readers with some context. The museum is not yet open and his voice echoes in the hushed gallery as he selects a handful of pieces to highlight from the exhibition of roughly 100 works representing some 50 American artists. It’s early in the morning at Harvard Art Museums and Joachim Homann is pacing through the watercolor exhibition that he co-curated.
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