When I learned how to paint a watercolor in nature with a single color layer and without the pencil sketch 1993

Curator: Here we have Alfred Freddy Krupa's 1993 watercolor, painted en plein air, a work whose title is as descriptive as it is charming: "When I learned how to paint a watercolor in nature with a single color layer and without the pencil sketch." Editor: Whoa. Just breathing it in, the watercolor feels almost weightless, like a hazy dream you barely catch before it fades. Is that a bridge? I’m instantly drawn into those watery reflections. Curator: Absolutely. Krupa's single-layer technique really shows the transparency that's unique to watercolor. There's an incredible lightness achieved through the artist's economy of means. Editor: That makes total sense. There's also an impatience to it I admire. Like, 'boom,' here's my emotional take on this place right now. What I see is more felt, I'd say, than perfectly rendered, and I mean that in the best possible way. You sense Krupa challenging the conventional ways of working in plein air. Curator: That directness probably ties into shifts we see in 20th-century art, valuing spontaneity over academic precision. Post-impressionism influenced a lot of painters looking to record individual perceptions with greater honesty and immediacy. Krupa seems to embrace that, prioritizing personal expression over idealized landscape traditions. Editor: It’s funny, a pencil sketch underneath can sometimes kill the magic for me, you know? Knowing this was done wet-on-wet, the fluidity becomes this key element. How the colors mingle creates movement, blurring lines so you just feel that scene. The blues with the yellows--I like that tension. Curator: I'm drawn to considering what choices shape artistic perception, such as technique, and also access. Impressionism as a movement became linked to social changes involving art becoming mobile through tubes, paints, easels, and artists accessing trains and outdoor spaces, which influenced choices around working style and speed. Krupa's painting seems part of this move. Editor: I get that! Now I want to ditch the studio for a bit and just...feel my way through a landscape. It makes me wonder if I’ve ever really *seen* nature the way Krupa did at that moment. It makes artmaking seem joyful again. Curator: Perhaps the true subject of his painting is that joy of discovery. Editor: I like that ending, a new beginning found, one splashy brushstroke at a time.