The Mountain

Artist Rebecca Salsbury James acquired this watercolor by John Marin, eventually giving it to the New Mexico Museum of Art through bequest in 1968. In 1918, Marin painted multiple views in the Hoosic or Hoosac Mountains in western Massachusetts. He defined the natural features with through reductive forms, expressive lines, and a limited palette. Marin declared that his paintings "have the music of themselves–so that they do stand of themselves as beautiful-forms-lines and paint on beautiful paper or canvas." As such, he was less concerned with a recognizable view of the scene than the emotional or spiritual response to a harmonious orchestration of aesthetic elements.