Pitcher c. 1937 - 1938

Curator: Well, hello there. First impressions? Because, looking at this little study…it’s making me thirsty! Editor: In the purely aesthetic sense, I’m struck by its restrained palette. Almost monochromatic in its variations of blues, and organized according to what appears to be two separate, stylized floral motifs, rendered with both watercolor and pencil. Curator: Yes, restrained is a polite way to put it! This lovely little page of studies—Giacinto Capelli’s, dating, oh, around 1937, 1938, called “Pitcher,” shows the artist experimenting, it seems, with decorations… Perhaps for ceramics, or textiles? A bit rough, like he's really just working things out, isn’t it? Editor: Precisely. It’s a clear record of the artist’s thought process. The bare outline of the pitcher grounds the more fanciful elements, and acts as a spatial index, doesn’t it? Note how he varies the treatment of form between the motifs; one bold and frontal, the other looser, almost cascading. He’s thinking about the dialectic between form and ornament. Curator: The thing I find fascinating is that he isn't trying to capture the real object in front of him; the pitcher, just a quick sketch! No, he’s playing around with the potential to prettify things, to take a humble vessel and bedazzle it! I can’t help but wonder where he might have landed if he had developed this exploration a bit more! Editor: True. And one must ask if Capelli, with this work, has perhaps elevated the "humble vessel" to an abstract representation of its ideal self. Each detail supports the overarching symbolic language here: the play of dark and light across these studies implies dimension without fully committing to realistic modeling, suggesting idealized rather than material form. Curator: Almost dreamy, like a blueprint for a particularly beautiful mirage. I do get lost in the possibility there! Editor: I, too, now see a somewhat altered impression. This brief assessment of our differing perspectives reveals to us something new of Capelli’s possible intent.