Broken Tractor 1942

Frances Hodgkins made this watercolour, Broken Tractor, with fluid washes and confident strokes. She has created a world that feels both familiar and strange, a bit like how dreams feel, right? I can imagine Hodgkins, brush in hand, circling the subject, teasing out forms from the landscape with ochres, blues, and browns. She probably wasn't striving for realism, but rather something more internal, more felt. There’s this playfulness in the forms, like how the tractor seems to be winking at us with those quirky, off-kilter eyes. It’s clunky but also charming, as though it has been brought to life through Hodgkins’s animated brushwork. Hodgkins was part of a generation of artists, like Georgia O’Keefe, exploring new ways of seeing and representing the world. So, next time you're stuck on a painting, remember Hodgkins and her broken tractor! Embrace the unexpected, let the medium guide you. After all, it's in those wonky, unpredictable moments that true creativity sparks to life.