Clematite 1998

Constantin Flondor made this watercolor called Clematite with fugitive washes and a restless line. I think what the artist was doing was playing with seeing, not just representing. The paper soaks up the water, and the pigment blooms and spreads. You have to work quickly with the medium, before it dries. I wonder if Flondor had to work at certain times of day, depending on the light, like Monet? There are several versions of the flower here, in various stages of becoming. Some are darker and more saturated, others are pale and translucent. Some are fully realized, while others are mere suggestions. There’s one I love in the middle of the painting, where you can see the back of the flower, like you're looking at it from underneath, its stem a stroke of muted green. In the end, painters are always in conversation with one another, challenging each other to discover and invent new ways of seeing the world.