Abstract
The fifteenth International Water Color Exhibition, which opened March 12 th at the Art Institute of Chicago, reinforces the suspicion that few artists today are seriously interested in water color. I do not mean that water color, as a medium, has fallen into any disrepute. Nor, indeed, do I want to imply that there is nothing of value in the present show. Rather, I would suggest that general dissatisfaction is being felt with water color as an end in itself, and this because by its very nature it is an ancillary art, dependent upon larger plastic forms and manners. Admirable for caricature, cartoon or illustration, because here both a bolster to, and dependent upon, the familiar line, it fails when called to constitute itself as a full-blooded major form. Water color, pure water color, does more than reward itself when it is critical, suggestive, capricious, insinuating. At best it is like the Ballet Russe, obliged forever to fold back upon itself. At best it is the recording of a mood, and because it is transparent and bound to a white surface, it is contrary to its nature to possess that volume and solidity which is the embodiment of a philosophy.
Published Version
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