Seelandschaft mit bergigem Ufer 1907

Cuno Amiet made this watercolor painting, Seelandschaft mit bergigem Ufer, without a specified date, with diluted washes and very fine lines. I can feel Amiet's gentle touch as he painted this vista, the soft blue bleeding into the paper, and the yellow-green leaves hanging from the branch above. He probably mixed the blue with a touch of white to make it more opaque as he brushed it across the paper in layers, building up the form of the distant shoreline. I've done that myself a million times. There is a delicate balance between representation and abstraction at play here; it's not quite a realistic landscape, and not entirely abstract either. Painters like Amiet are constantly responding to the world around them. He is creating an image of nature filtered through his own sensibility, inviting us to contemplate the beauty and mystery of the natural world along with him.