Shaker Refectory Table with Benches c. 1936

Alfred H. Smith made this Shaker Refectory Table with Benches sometime between the late 19th and early 20th century, in watercolor, graphite, and colored pencil on paper. I’m really struck by the rendering here, the way Smith uses a limited palette to give us just enough visual information. There’s this really gorgeous warm honey tone on the tabletop, with an almost imperceptible grain, and then that lovely, muted red on the benches and the trim of the table. The whole thing is rendered with such care. Look at how the shadows are depicted, just a gentle wash of grey, giving the whole scene a ghostly, ethereal quality. What Smith has achieved is a kind of quiet monumentality that reminds me of some of those early American folk artists like Joseph Pickett. I like to think of art as an ongoing conversation, a kind of call and response across time. And this drawing is a beautiful articulation of that idea.