Fire Extinguisher c. 1940

Loraine Makimson painted this fire extinguisher, sometime before 1995. It's mostly blues, with a star in the middle and a kind of retro, futuristic vibe. I think what grabs me is the way Makimson uses the watercolor to play with light and shadow. It's like she's really thinking about how light moves across this smooth surface, using the paint to model the form. Look how the crisp lines of the fire extinguisher contrast with the soft, washy background. It’s a formal device, like a visual joke. She is able to describe the object but also dissolve it. There’s a push and pull between clarity and ambiguity. This piece reminds me a little bit of some of Alex Katz’s paintings. They’re both interested in capturing a certain kind of clarity, but also allowing the image to dissolve into abstraction. Ultimately, it’s about the ongoing dialogue between artists across generations, each riffing on ideas, remixing and reimagining.