The Callers 1925

Dean Cornwell made The Callers with paint, and likely some kind of solvent or medium, and what I notice first is its fluidity. Look at the way the medium thins out the paint, creating these transparent layers and washes, like watercolor almost. It's like the artist is thinking through the act of painting itself. See the old man’s hand on his walking stick; there is a looseness to it, which gives the painting an off-the-cuff quality, a sense of immediacy. Everything is in motion here, like this is a story unfolding before our eyes. The buildings are peeling away, like they're melting into the background. This work reminds me of Manet, in the way it captures the essence of a scene with so few strokes. It embraces a certain ambiguity, and doesn’t try to tell you what to think, but invites you to look, and then look again.