Minneapolis Museum c. 1930 - 1931

William Channing Whitney made this watercolor on paper, a design for the Minneapolis Museum. The lines are precise, but the colours have a looseness, a playful quality. It's like Whitney is thinking out loud, the architecture coming into being through his process. Look closely, and you can see the hand of the artist in the subtle variations of the washes, a delicate dance between intention and chance. The column, with its Corinthian capital, rendered in shades of gold and red, feels almost fleshy, a contrast to the geometric precision of the ceiling design above. I’m struck by how the materiality of the watercolor, its fluidity and transparency, brings a human element to the grandeur of classical architecture. It brings to mind Piranesi, whose etchings were these elaborate, imagined architectural spaces. Both artists invite us to consider architecture not just as structure, but as a realm of imagination and possibility. Art really is an ongoing dialogue, don’t you think?