Plate c. 1936

William Kerby made this watercolor of a plate, sometime between the late 19th and early 20th century. There’s a cascade of blues here, layer upon layer, swirling around a central image. It's a painting of a plate, yes, but it's also a landscape, and Kerby is inviting us into his world. Look at the falls, the way the water seems to pulse and flow. I can imagine Kerby, brush in hand, trying to capture not just the look but the feel of that cascading water. And then there’s the border, a flurry of blue motifs – shells, maybe? – that add a sense of movement and energy. It makes me think about the countless artists who’ve found inspiration in the everyday, transforming the mundane into something magical. Each stroke of the brush, each layer of color, a record of the artist’s own looking and feeling.