Wooden Retablo, San Antonio c. 1937

Majel G. Claflin made this watercolor retablo of San Antonio, we don’t know exactly when. It has this lovely directness. You can sense the artist feeling her way through the painting process. The colors are bright, simple. Red, green, yellow. It's almost like she's making up her own folk vocabulary, like the vine with teardrop leaves that frames the figures. And the way she’s painted the robes: these bold stripes of color, one nestled inside the other. Look closely, and you can see the brushstrokes, how she built up those curves, each layer reacting to the last. The whole piece feels like a conversation, Claflin talking to herself, figuring it out as she goes. Her work makes me think of Marsden Hartley, the way he took folk art and turned it into something really personal and strange. It’s a reminder that art doesn’t have to be polished or perfect. It can be rough, immediate, and full of feeling.