Every once in a while I like to show here a work of art we’ve acquired. Nan and I don’t simply hang our own work – we apperciate art and have an extensive collection of pieces from area artists, going back many decades. We stumbled on this little piece at, of all places, the town’s saturday market. The young lady, Lori Ryan, is relatively new to watercolor, she said about a year. She’s obviously working, at this stage, to develope her own style. We thought the work was cute, and then both of us, separately, zeroed in on this little 7.5x9.5 piece. It is an exercise in b&w / a b&w watercolor /  titled “Black and White” oddly enough.

An encouraging sign was that she would seem to have already known there was something nice about it. It was priced a little higher than others of a similar size. We actually chastized her a little for making a common mistake of young artists, offering to come down on a piece that’s not overpriced for what it is.

We’ll try and keep an eye on her development – I’m curious as to whether she does some more experimenting with b&w (man that would make for a cool exhibit theme). We did remat it because b&w seldom looks right with a white-white mat – off white works much better. It’s in a frame and hanging now. Admittedly our collection is oversized and pieces have to be rotated a little, but it’s fun.

And hey, she lives in Havre de Grace, cool…

Ps: Any painting is difficult to represent faithfully, just look at any two book representations of a famous painting – the difference will be striking, and b&w complicates that.