Mustard Pot c. 1936

John Dana painted this "Mustard Pot" with watercolour and graphite. The image shimmers into being through thin washes and precise lines that evoke the glass-like surface of the pot. I imagine Dana, squinting, carefully rendering the play of light on its ridged form. How hard to capture that luminosity with graphite! Is it the subtle gradations that give it that three-dimensional feel, or the way each line tapers and curves just so? I'm fascinated by this dedication to observation, which seems so opposite from my own frenetic painting style. It makes me think about artists like Giorgio Morandi, who spent a lifetime studying the nuances of simple objects. There's a quiet intensity here, a devotion to the everyday that elevates the humble mustard pot to something sublime. It makes you wonder, what other untold stories lie hidden in the things we overlook?