Pottery Jug c. 1936

Willoughby Ions made this Pottery Jug with what looks like watercolor paints, and maybe some graphite. It is so cool! I imagine Ions staring at this jug, trying to capture its roundness, its stillness. The jug is brown, with a kind of reddish undertone, and you can see how the paint sort of pools and gathers in certain spots, giving it this wonderful, mottled texture. I bet he was fascinated by the way light hit the surface, creating these subtle shifts in color and value. See how there’s a darker shadow on one side, and a lighter highlight on the other? It’s like he’s trying to understand the jug from every angle, trying to figure out how it exists in space. It reminds me a little bit of Giorgio Morandi, you know, the Italian painter who spent his whole life painting bottles and jars. Both artists found something profound and beautiful in these everyday objects. They invite us to slow down and really see the world around us. We, as painters, are all in conversation, trying to figure out how to capture the essence of things, how to translate the world into paint.