Doll - "Lydia Sherman" c. 1937

Josephine Romano made this watercolour of a doll named Lydia Sherman, sometime in the 20th century. There’s something so tender in the way it’s painted. It’s all soft washes and gentle outlines, like she’s trying to capture not just the doll's appearance, but its spirit. The colours are muted, almost faded, giving it a nostalgic feel. You can see the paper underneath in places, especially in the white of her clothes, which gives the whole piece an airy lightness. Look at the little details, like the curls in her hair and the dainty trim on her pantaloons. These parts seem so precisely rendered, but then there are more gestural elements, such as the brushstrokes on her arms, where the grain of the paper is still visible. The contrast between the attention to detail and the loose brushwork reminds me of the work of Fairfield Porter, who was also interested in the everyday. Like Porter, Romano finds the extraordinary in the ordinary. Art is an ongoing conversation and it seems that Romano is asking us to think about this unassuming object, and the stories that it carries.