Castle Near Botzen, Italy 19th-20th century

Curator: This is Denman Waldo Ross’s “Castle Near Botzen, Italy,” a pencil drawing housed here at the Harvard Art Museums. Editor: It's like a memory fading on the page, delicate and skeletal. Curator: Ross was deeply involved with the Arts and Crafts movement; he appreciated the inherent value of process and materials. Look closely, and you can almost feel the artist's hand moving across the paper. Editor: Right, the visible strokes are key. The castle's solidity becomes less important than the act of representing it. What does the paper itself tell us about Ross's practice, and the social context in which he created this? Curator: It whispers of a bygone era, a yearning for simpler times. I find it beautiful in its incompleteness. Editor: Indeed, it urges us to consider the labor and resources invested in the creation of even a seemingly ephemeral sketch. Curator: Ultimately, it's a reminder that beauty can be found in the humblest of forms.