Andrew Wyeth The Prussian Painting

Title: The Prussian
Artist: Andrew Wyeth
Painted: 1974
Medium: Painting / Print / Watercolor

About Andrew Wyeth The Prussian Painting

Andrew Wyeth painted The Prussian in 1974, just three years after his initial meeting with Helga. It is one of several works from the series in drybrush, a technique that allowed Wyeth to achieve a greater level of detail and a richer, more sculptural surface than is typically seen in his watercolors. “I work in drybrush when my emotion gets deep enough into a subject,” the artist explained. “I paint with a smaller brush, dip it into the watercolor color, play out the brush and bristles, squeeze out a good deal of the moisture and color with my fingers so that there is only a very small amount of paint left… It’s a definite weaving process–you weave the layers of drybrush over and within the broad washes of watercolor”