Trip 2 to Abbot Hall

Second trip to Abbot Hall 15/02/2023 to view three paintings, three works on paper and browse the costume store.

Bemersyde Moss by Earl Haig - Possibilities in the expressiveness of his landscapes. I particularly liked the lines in the foreground, what are they, people, birds, fence posts? So many possible interpretations.

Midsummer Rise - Gorgeous, luminous surface. Ambiguity - Is it a cloud? Is it smoke? A distant fire seen from a hill top as roofs burn. Cloud lifted off the surface rather than painted on.

At the Head of Ullswater August 18th 1789 with two portraits. Not clear who the portraits are but they are beautifully periwigged! Barrier between artist and landscape by being an outsider. This person draws it as one goes to a zoo.

Constable drawing - easy and spontaneous trees, solitary feeling from the use of negative space - what is not there.

Man’s Head Rock - What is left out of this is perhaps better than what is in it.

Costume collection - possibility for props, period drapery painting worn like Giovanelli’s ‘Wager’.