Edward Henry Potthast: Water Lilies (1917)

“Standing at the intersection of Impressionism and Realism, Potthast embraced the bustle of places such as Coney Island, Far Rockaway and Brighton Beach, the more populist haunts. Like the Realists, Potthast focused on energetic compositions rather than the kind of languid gentility often portrayed by the Impressionists; yet, like the Impressionists, he painted in a palette of high color and lightness. With artistic bravura and a painterly surface, Potthast renders Water Lilies with a masterly sense of composition as the figures’ clothes flutter in the ocean breeze. As in the present work, according to Diane Smith-Hurd, Potthast’s painting is “at its best with subtleties of color in reflected light, as well as color in…