Rush Holder c. 1939

This drawing of a Rush Holder was made by John Petrucci, who was born in 1855. This is a sweet little watercolor, a study in brown, rust, and ochre. I like to think about how Petrucci might have really looked at this object, with deep attention, and felt the weight and the form of it in his own body. He noticed how the rush holder curls and twists up and around. I can imagine him, squinting his eyes, patiently mixing the exact shades of brown to capture the color of old iron. Petrucci is part of a conversation that’s been going on for centuries between artists trying to capture the essence of simple objects. It reminds me of Morandi and his bottles. I like to think of artists, like Petrucci, in an ongoing conversation, exchanging ideas across time.