1928
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Dominant colour
On Morse Mountain, No. 6, Maine is a 1928 by John Marin, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
You see jagged black lines and splashes of dark blue and green on white paper—like a stormy Maine coast scribbled in charcoal and ink. Marin drew right on the paper with dry charcoal, then brushed watery ink over it. The black shapes feel rough and sudden, almost like the rocks he’s showing. He did this every summer for years, testing how dark he could go. If you like this bold, messy energy, look up impasto—a technique where paint is slapped on thick.
One of America's most important watercolor practitioners, John Marin spent every summer in Maine from 1914 through 1928, and the state's coastline became a central focus of his work. By the late 1920s, when this work was made, he was experimenting with bold black elements in his compositions and painted frames or borders. On Morse Mountain, No. 6, Maine shows Marin using dry charcoal to create areas of shocking black over which he layered inky black wash. The technique has the effect of framing the image and leading the eye toward the center. With its strikingly different character from other…
John Marin made this watercolor during one of the last summers he would spend in Maine, at a time when he called most of the watercolors he executed "Movements in Paint."
Read the full account in the museum source.
John Marin (December 23, 1870 – October 2, 1953) was an early American modernist visual artist. He is known for his abstract landscape paintings and watercolors.
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