Silk Apron c. 1938

This is Rex F. Bush's "Silk Apron," made with some kind of drawing media on paper. I'm immediately drawn to how the apron is both present and absent. Bush hasn't filled in the apron's form with a solid block of color, but instead used a kind of hatched shading to give it volume and presence. Look how the red embroidery sings against the dark fabric. The textures! I wonder if the drawing itself has a slightly velvety feel, a nod to the silk it depicts? My eye keeps going to the tassels, how they anchor the piece, framing it with their feathery ends. It reminds me of Morandi's still lifes – the way simple objects become monumental through attention and care. And like Morandi, Bush shows us that the everyday can be extraordinary, if we really look. Art, after all, is just another way of seeing.