Colonnade of the Casino of the Villa Albani, in Rome

Hubert Robert made this watercolor, ‘Colonnade of the Casino of the Villa Albani, in Rome,’ with pen, brown ink, and gray wash. Robert employed traditional art materials to depict the architecture. But these classical forms—the smooth columns, the barrel-vaulted ceiling—were themselves born of intensive labor: quarried stone, carved by hand. They are as much the product of making as any humble craft object. We see the figures are drawn with equal care, as if they are part of the architecture itself. In his characteristic way, Robert blurs the boundaries between lived activity and formal design. The washes, combined with the hatching of the pen lines, create a sense of depth, a believable, habitable space. But it is not just the space of aristocratic leisure; it is also the space of work. Robert challenges distinctions between art and craft by emphasizing the labor embedded in every stage of the scene, from the quarry to the canvas.