Landscape with sheep
1989
watercolor
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
1989
watercolor
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
You see soft green hills dotted with white sheep under a pale blue sky. The colors bleed into each other like wet paper. Joan Hodes painted this in 1989, long after studying with Oskar Kokoschka, a painter who taught her to see light as something alive. She used watercolor’s unpredictability—letting the paint spread and mix on its own—to make the landscape feel quiet and alive at the same time. If you like how the colors seem to breathe, look up the technique *sfumato*.
