Untitled (Construction Scene, New York) c. 1940

This watercolour was made by Dong Kingman, capturing a New York construction site. You can see the brushstrokes are loose, economical, and confident, aren’t they? I can almost imagine him working on site, quickly mapping out what he sees with watercolour washes. It’s like Kingman is celebrating the sheer optimism and the scale of the modern city. The earthy palette of greys, ochres, and blues evoke the grit and industry. But there’s also a lightness, a sense of the sky opening up above the construction. I love how the cranes reach upwards, like skeletal giants. And those workers? They’re tiny, almost lost in the immensity of it all. I think Kingman's work really gets at the buzz of creative chaos. The sense of a city constantly rebuilding itself—always a work in progress. It reminds me a bit of Lyonel Feininger, who was also interested in cityscapes, though using a totally different approach to geometry and space. Anyway, the work of one artist speaks to another!