DOI issue:
No. 241 (April 1913)
DOI article:Finberg, Alexander Joseph: Mr. J. Walter West's landscapes
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21160#0203
Mr. Walter IVesfs Landscapes
moping and restless bats. The only tangible part
of the tree is its sinuous and graceful branches.
But the darkness is filled with moving lights. The
fire-flies dance over the grass and among the almost
imperceptible leaves of the olive, and the sky and
the distant terraces palpitate with the dying gleams
of an Italian summer's day.
Moonlight on Como takes us from the restless
enchantment of the Southern twilight into the
peace and serenity of night. The tall tower of the
Lombard church seems sleeping in the pale
greenish-blue moonlight, its base lost in a cloud of
olives. The church stands on an eminence which
slopes down to Lake Como. Lights gleam on the
cold blue waters of the distant lake, and beyond,
on the other side of the lake, the far-off peaks of
snow-clad mountains flash back the cold light of
the moon.
But it is not only the magic of the evening and
the night that appeals to Mr. West's imagination.
He is evidently an early riser, as all the great
landscape painters have been. A friend of mine
once told me that he had heard Turner say that
he had not missed many sunsets during his life,
but that he had hardly ever missed watching the
sun rise. Like Turner Mr. West is fully alive to
the splendid opportunities which nature provides
with the dawning day. What a fine and thrilling
drama he has recorded for us in his picture of
Sunrise, Richmond, Yorkshire. Unfortunately the
tones of this beautiful drawing are too subtle to be
successfully reproduced in black and white. The
whole picture is filled with the mists of the morning.
High up on the left of the design the ruined walls
of Richmond Castle loom against the sky. Over
on the right the first gleams of the rising sun strike
downward, casting strange shadows from the ruined
battlements. The only sharply defined forms in
the drawing are in the foreground on the right,
where the sunlight pours like a stream of molten
gold over the river-bed.
Another morning subject is that of Theodelindds
Castle. It is, I believe, a ruined stronghold which
stands out gaunt on the rocks above Varenna, on
Lake Como. The town nestling at its feet on the
margin of the lake is entirely blotted out by the
early morning mists, which the sun has not yet
dispelled.
A third subject of this kind is the June Sunrise
in the Swale Valley, but it does not strike me as
quite so successful as its companions. The
fantastic shadows cast by the turrets of the castle
"JUNE SUNRISE IN THE SWALE VALLEY" (WATER-COLOUR)
180
BY J. WALTER WEST, R.W.S.
moping and restless bats. The only tangible part
of the tree is its sinuous and graceful branches.
But the darkness is filled with moving lights. The
fire-flies dance over the grass and among the almost
imperceptible leaves of the olive, and the sky and
the distant terraces palpitate with the dying gleams
of an Italian summer's day.
Moonlight on Como takes us from the restless
enchantment of the Southern twilight into the
peace and serenity of night. The tall tower of the
Lombard church seems sleeping in the pale
greenish-blue moonlight, its base lost in a cloud of
olives. The church stands on an eminence which
slopes down to Lake Como. Lights gleam on the
cold blue waters of the distant lake, and beyond,
on the other side of the lake, the far-off peaks of
snow-clad mountains flash back the cold light of
the moon.
But it is not only the magic of the evening and
the night that appeals to Mr. West's imagination.
He is evidently an early riser, as all the great
landscape painters have been. A friend of mine
once told me that he had heard Turner say that
he had not missed many sunsets during his life,
but that he had hardly ever missed watching the
sun rise. Like Turner Mr. West is fully alive to
the splendid opportunities which nature provides
with the dawning day. What a fine and thrilling
drama he has recorded for us in his picture of
Sunrise, Richmond, Yorkshire. Unfortunately the
tones of this beautiful drawing are too subtle to be
successfully reproduced in black and white. The
whole picture is filled with the mists of the morning.
High up on the left of the design the ruined walls
of Richmond Castle loom against the sky. Over
on the right the first gleams of the rising sun strike
downward, casting strange shadows from the ruined
battlements. The only sharply defined forms in
the drawing are in the foreground on the right,
where the sunlight pours like a stream of molten
gold over the river-bed.
Another morning subject is that of Theodelindds
Castle. It is, I believe, a ruined stronghold which
stands out gaunt on the rocks above Varenna, on
Lake Como. The town nestling at its feet on the
margin of the lake is entirely blotted out by the
early morning mists, which the sun has not yet
dispelled.
A third subject of this kind is the June Sunrise
in the Swale Valley, but it does not strike me as
quite so successful as its companions. The
fantastic shadows cast by the turrets of the castle
"JUNE SUNRISE IN THE SWALE VALLEY" (WATER-COLOUR)
180
BY J. WALTER WEST, R.W.S.