Ceiling Decoration c. 1941

William Kieckhofel made this "Ceiling Decoration" with what looks like watercolor, sometime between 1855 and 1995. There's something so immediate and charming about seeing these fluid washes of colour. It makes you think about the initial spark of an idea, before all the layers of complexity get added in. I find myself staring at the intersection where the pale arches meet. The way the pigment settles into the paper's texture creates this feeling of age, almost like you could reach out and touch the cracks in the plaster. It's so interesting to see this interplay between surface and representation, the way the medium itself becomes part of the story. It has a kinship to the work of someone like Cy Twombly, who was similarly interested in the raw, gestural qualities of mark-making. Ultimately, it’s a reminder that art is always in conversation with itself.