On the River – (Paul Klee) ◄ Previous Next ►

Artist: Paul Klee

Date: 1939

Museum: McNay Art Museum (San Antonio, United States)

Technique: Watercolor

On the River shows Klee’s love of simplicity, of the nature of the river untouched by man. This childlike painting with its unsophisticated drawings displays stick figures in a boat. In the center, interlocking curved lines form fingerlike shapes. At the right side, a boat rests on an object that repeats the curved interlocking lines. Soft and muted colors of yellow, gold, orange, blue, and green fill stretched, rectangular handkerchief fabric, a highly unusual choice as the support surface, but not unlike the playful ingenuity of Klee’s compositions. Black crayon outlines the objects. Watercolor strokes, added after the crayon drawings, are rough in texture. The background of the work is cream colored with splotches of fading color throughout.This abstract work is about lines, shapes, and color. Paul Klee called art a “language of signs.” The drawing of the boat resembles the truthfulness and creativity in children, often lacking in adult artists. The simple universal forms can be interpreted in many ways. Klee declared, about color, “I no longer had to chase after it. Color and I are one. I am a painter.” Nature was an inspiration in this painting and the artist examined the world around him with the care of both an artist and a meticulous scientist. The thoughtful rendering and placement of lines enabled him to express so much with what seems like very little. Klee wrote of his work at this time, “The picture has no particular purpose––It only has the purpose of making us happy.”