Alfred William Hunt (1830-1896)
Climbing Shadows
John William North (1842-1924)
'The bat begins with giddy wing' - Barley Field over the Hedge
Watercolour with pencil with scratching out; initialled and dated 1885, labelled with artist and title
11 ½ x 17 ¾ inches
£8,500
Provenance
Phillips, Bath, 13 February 1995, lot 16;
The Maas Gallery, London, October 1998;
Stanley Seeger
North has taken as the title of his watercolour a poem from a remarkable book by Thomas Forster (his Circle of the Seasons and Perpetual Key to the Calendar and Almanack, London, 1828, p 409) describing the 'history, antiquities and natural phenomena of each day in the year', in this case August 16th.
The Bat begins with giddy wing
His circuit round the shed and tree;
And clouds of dancing gnats to sing
A Summer night's serenity.
North's wanting 'to make his drawings tingle and shimmer with light led him to paint multitudinous details melting together, with spots and particles of pure colour. His method can be compared with pointillisme; certainly, he was groping for method of expression which the French Impressionists developed more fully’ (Martin Hardie, Watercolour Painting in Britain, Vol. III The Victorian Period, 1968, p.138).
