Still Life with Corn, Charles Ethan Porter; watercolor on paper, 11 x 17 in, (27 x 43 cm); in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Though watercolor and gouahe are common in botanical art, they are infrequently usesd for still life paintings. There’s something I particularly like about those that I’m familiar with, and it’s always a treat to come across some that are new to me.
Charles Ethan Porter was an American painter active in the late 19th and early 20th centuries who focused primarily on still life. Though he also painted in oil, here he uses textural qualities available in watercolor (and perhaps gouache) to let us feel the texture of the husks, the gentle umps of the kernels of corn and the smooth sphere of the apple.
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