Untitled (Along the Erie Canal) 1934

William J. Scott made this little print of the Erie Canal, with its dark pencil marks, sometime in the first half of the 20th century. I can imagine Scott outside, looking at the canal and starting to draw, maybe on a grey day, trying to get the essence of the scene down. The man on the boat seems tiny against the vast landscape of hills, trees, and that big sky! It's interesting how the softness of the pencil gives everything a blurry, dreamy feeling. Even the mountains seem kind of soft and rounded. I wonder if he was thinking about other artists who drew landscapes, or if he was just trying to capture a moment in time. It's all about looking and responding, isn't it? We all do it, we artists, like a long conversation across time.