Flowers 1908

Curator: Look at how delicately rendered this piece is! What is your initial response to the overall form? Editor: Immediate thoughts? Muted joy. The color palette is predominantly earth-toned with bursts of muted blues, yellows, and oranges. The translucent quality of what I suspect are watercolors adds to a serene atmosphere, despite the presence of what seems to be quite dense floral content. What can you tell me about its context? Curator: Indeed! We are currently observing "Flowers", a 1908 watercolor work by Martiros Sarian, painted in an impressionistic style, while bearing the obvious stylistic signatures of post-impressionism in the planes and colours. Let us begin by examining Sarian's usage of structural arrangements. Notice how the forms blend, but are still distinguishable from one another in shapes. What do you notice? Editor: Well, first the apparent transparency—there's something lovely about how the medium lends itself to the idea of fragility, especially fitting considering the subject. The choice to depict flowers, items that are necessarily temporary. But beyond the metaphor, watercolor painting had connotations. Was Sarian reacting to or participating in those? Was watercolor deemed ‘lesser’ than oil in its day, therefore functioning as some subtle anti-establishment stance? Curator: In a sense, it democratizes art. I am also struck by the compositional balance. The weight is distributed throughout the frame; from base of the vase up through the subtle variance in flower colour and their gentle tilt this way and that, creating an overall harmony of spatial relationships that create visual rhyme. Do you find this balanced relationship supports or contradicts the feeling of ‘muted joy’ that you mentioned before? Editor: Good observation on harmony—and I think it’s actually what complicates the emotion for me. Balanced doesn’t necessarily equate to unreserved joy. To me, that structural integrity speaks of restraint and suggests that materials impact feelings, you know? If this was done in heavy impasto, thick daubs of vibrant oil paint, I think my interpretation might be totally different, but it seems as though even Sarian himself might have found this beauty fleeting in it's ephemerality by means of its media selection. Curator: That’s a fascinating counterpoint—a very compelling analysis on material restraint as active expression! I certainly leave here with renewed perspectives and thoughts.