Wild Roses 1961

Fairfield Porter’s scene, titled "Wild Roses," feels like it was painted on a cloudy day with short bursts of saturated colour laid down in distinct brush marks. I can imagine him trying to capture something fleeting, and it makes me wonder about the way he worked. The paint looks pretty fluid, and there's a real directness in his marks, not overworked. He's juggling a muted palette of greens and grays against the bright pink of the wild roses. Look at the lower left: a sort of creamy beige patch seems to push forward and flatten the whole scene. It reminds me of some of Marsden Hartley's paintings, that quality of pushing abstraction right up to the edge of representation. But Porter keeps it loose and breezy, inviting you to see those roses dancing in the wind. Painting is always an exchange, a conversation across time. Artists build on what came before, tweaking and responding to the way others have tried to capture the world.