"Lake by the Mountains" Watercolor American Modern Landscape by Edna Stoddart

A poetic vision of place, memory, and emotional color.

In this luminous Watercolor Landscape, Edna Stoddart transports us to a dreamlike valley where mountains cradle a winding river, dotted with serene homes and anchored boats. The composition is intimate yet expansive, stylized but grounded.

Painted in vibrant, expressive washes of green, rose, and lavender, the landscape seems almost to pulse with quiet life. The pink sky reflects on the water like a whisper of dawn or dusk, while the jewel-toned boats in the foreground add rhythm and charm. The villages nestled into the hillsides suggest community, continuity, and quiet resilience, evoking the calm and mystery of a place half-remembered, half-imagined.

Edna Stoddart (1888–1966) was a Californian painter, diarist, and writer, celebrated for her colorful, deeply personal works that often blended fantasy and autobiography. Closely associated with the Bay Area art scene, her work resisted formal categorization, bridging post-impressionism, folk art, and early modernism. A committed chronicler of inner and outer worlds, Stoddart believed in the storytelling power of color and line — something evident in this piece.

Created during a period when American women artists were carving out space for personal narrative in landscape and genre painting, this watercolor reflects a gentle rebellion against realism. Instead of mirroring the world, Stoddart interprets it emotionally, inviting the viewer not to observe, but to feel.

This painting would grace any collection that values female voices, West Coast modernism, and the unique dialogue between imagination and geography. A visual poem rendered in color and light, Watercolor Landscape is both timeless and quietly radical.

REFERENCE NUMBER: LU654316434802
PERIOD: 1950-1959
CONDITION: Excellent
MEASUREMENTS: Height: 26.25" Width: 30.25" Depth: 1"
COUNT: 1
MATERIAL: Watercolor
CREATOR: Edna Stoddart