In one of my posts I listed five artists whom I revere, respect and enjoy. As of result of having to narrow my list and prune it down to just five names, I was forced to leave out hundreds of artists and many individual works that make my spirit sing, (that cheesy sentence, although intrinsically honest, was put in to make Lucy snigger, so if you are not Lucy just ignore it.) So to rectify this terrible injustice I have decided to begin a regular post. Hopefully a daily one, where I shall introduce either an artist or piece of work that moves me. I might even include one that makes me sick every once in a while!
Today's item is a beautiful painting by Walter Sickert, A German born English painter and a member of The Camden Town Group. You can find out more about him very easily so I shan't bore you with too much information here.
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| Brighton Pierrots by Walter Sickert, 1915 |
Brighton Pierrots ia a sublime painting that depicts a joyful subject in a melancholy light. A troupe of performers stand onstage in the setting sun. Sickert painted it in 1915, and the empty rows of deckchairs maybe a nod to the absent men fighting across the sea. The light is what makes this picture,both the natural and artificial. There is the natural twilight that throws everything into sharp focus and sends a shiver of strange sadness at such transitory, fleeting beauty down your spine, the reddish horizon that suggests the colours of war (It was said that the sound of guns from the western front could be heard all along the south coast)..Then we have the artificial stage light that gives us the garish colours of the Pierrots outfits, acid pink and icy blue that appear so incongruous and unseemly in the face of impending peril and looming disaster. The performers know that 'the show must go on', so it goes on more ridiculous and pathetic than artistic. I love this painting, and for anyone who say art doesn't move them, I say where the hell is your heart?
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