Piggin c. 1938

Annie B. Johnston made this watercolor of a wooden 'Piggin', at an unknown date. The way Johnston uses parallel lines to describe the wooden staves of this vessel makes me think about the simple, repetitive actions that all artmaking involves. Look closely, and you can see how Johnston creates the illusion of depth and texture with a limited palette of browns and tans. It’s all about the layering; thin washes building up to describe the cylindrical form, the light catching the rim, and the shadow it casts. See how the wood grain is rendered with such loving attention? It's like each stroke is a meditation on the material, elevating the ordinary into something worthy of contemplation. There’s something quietly radical about focusing on everyday objects, like a fellow artist, Fairfield Porter. Both understand the power of the mundane, transforming it through close observation and dedicated mark-making. Art, after all, is about seeing the world anew, finding the extraordinary in the ordinary.