Horse c. 1938

James Baare Turnbull made this watercolour painting of a horse at an unknown date. The simple application of colour is striking, don't you think? It really brings out the shape and form of the animal. I love how Turnbull uses thin washes of brown and grey to give the horse a sense of depth and movement, with very minimal details. It's like he's trying to capture the essence of the horse. The way he's rendered the legs, they almost seem frozen in mid-air. There's a beautiful looseness to the brushstrokes too, especially around the mane and tail, which gives the painting a real sense of energy. The eye is just a simple white dot, but it somehow manages to convey a sense of the horse's spirit. Turnbull's painting reminds me a bit of Franz Marc's animal paintings, in the way that he uses color and form to express something deeper about the natural world. Both artists share a desire to capture the essence of their subjects, rather than just creating a realistic depiction.