Gloucester c. 1915

Maurice Prendergast made this watercolor called "Gloucester" sometime in his career. The blues and greens are so fresh they practically burst from the paper. I can imagine Prendergast outside, maybe even sitting on one of those rocks, squinting in the sun, trying to capture the scene before him. He's using the watercolor in these broad, washy strokes, letting the colors bleed into each other, but still maintaining some control with those darker outlines. You can see the way he’s layering the blues and greens, trying to get the depth of the ocean and the feel of the sky just right. The figures in the foreground are just these little pops of color, but they add so much to the scene. It's like he’s saying, "Here, look at this amazing place, this is how it feels to be here." It reminds me of the way other painters like Bonnard or Vuillard used color to capture a mood. It makes me want to grab my own paints and try to capture a little piece of the world around me.