Chair (painted) c. 1937

Lillian Causey made this painting of a chair, date unknown, and I can really imagine her sitting in front of it, patiently mixing washes of brown watercolour to capture the light on the wood. The paint is applied so thinly and smoothly, it’s almost like a stain, soaking into the paper. And the way she’s outlined the chair with these delicate stripes, well, it gives it this graphic, almost cartoonish feel. I wonder if she was thinking about the tradition of furniture portraiture, or maybe she was just drawn to the simple beauty of everyday objects. It's funny, because painting something so ordinary can be a real challenge, you have to find the extraordinary in the mundane, you know? I can imagine her squinting, trying to capture the exact curve of the backrest, the way the light catches the legs. There’s a lot of love in that process, a real tenderness towards the subject. It reminds me of Fairfield Porter, who also had a knack for making the ordinary feel profound. Anyway, artists have always looked to each other, borrowing and riffing and finding their own way. It's all one big conversation, really.