Portofino, Italy 19th-20th century

Curator: Here we have Denman Waldo Ross's watercolor, "Portofino, Italy," housed at the Harvard Art Museums. Editor: It feels like a hazy dream. The blues and whites are so soft, almost blurring the lines between water, sky, and distant mountains. Curator: Ross was deeply invested in the materials themselves. He explored color theory extensively and even developed his own system for organizing pigments. You see that evidenced in the limited yet harmonious palette. Editor: The masts of the ship are so central, aren't they? Dominating the composition. They almost read as religious symbols, reaching towards the heavens. Perhaps signifying exploration, aspiration... Curator: And think about the social context: travel, leisure, the rise of watercolor as a medium for the upper classes to document their journeys. It's not just pretty; it's indicative of a specific cultural moment. Editor: I find myself pondering what Portofino represented in the cultural imagination then, and perhaps still does now. A place of beauty, escape... Curator: True. For me, it is the application that reveals the artist's mastery. The materiality, not just the symbol. Editor: It's both, isn't it? They feed each other.