Morning Shadows 1908

Willard Metcalf conjured this scene with oils, likely en plein air, capturing an autumnal landscape with dabs and strokes of color. The composition guides your eye down a path, flanked by trees ablaze with autumnal colors. I imagine Metcalf, squinting, trying to capture the ephemeral light and shadow playing across the scene. What’s so interesting here is how the shadows, painted in cool purples and blues, cut across the warm greens and yellows of the field, creating this vibrating, almost electric effect. It's clear he was part of that lineage of painters who were obsessed with light, like Monet. Metcalf must have been totally immersed in the act of translating the three-dimensional world onto a flat surface, wrestling with color and form, trying to pin down the fleeting beauty of a New England morning. It’s like he’s saying, “Look, isn’t this amazing?” And, yeah, it totally is. We’re all just trying to figure out how to see, and then how to show what we see to others.