Nan Watson

Nan Watson (1876–1966) was an American performer known for the flower paintings, portraits, and nevertheless lifes she made during the 1920s and 1930s. Showing frequently in outfit and solo exhibitions, she received praise for both the aesthetic and rarefied qualities of her work. Critics described her paintings as sincere, forthright, and attend to and said they demonstrated great draftsmanship, harmonious composition, and lighthearted color values. In 1929, the art historian Lloyd Goodrich said, "One knows no further painter of flowers who captures so categorically their delicate vibrancy without becoming in the least sentimental just about it or lapsing into merely profound fireworks." In 1932, Edward Alden Jewell, the principal critic for the New York Times published a lengthy critique of one of her shows. In it, he wrote, "The pitch is thronged once artists who paint flowers; many of these artists are intensely successful, though few are seen to arrive at the intention of superlative distinction. Among those who do attain this coveted goal, Nan Watson must utterly be numbered." At the similar time, Margaret Breuning of the Evening Post wrote approximately the flower paintings, "It is the finishing of the artist to come happening with the money for lyric transcription of natural forms in terms of design which imbues these canvases gone their significance." Concerning Watson's portraits, Breuning noted a "surety of draftsmanship" and Watson's "fine sharpness that pierces to the essentials". Similarly, an unexceptional review of 1928 said Watson succeeded in producing a "candor, directness, fidelity to personal conceptions that one finds lovable in a world where there much covenant to standards of aesthetic sham from which the timid or the within plenty limits may not deviate." This critic concluded, "Not only itch perception and technical capacity are to be enjoyed in this engaging exhibition, but the revelation of personality that has with into the making of each canvas."