Birds Eye View

When still in his teens, Richard created the sweep of Chesil Beach as viewed from an elevated position and in the mid 30s he painted Whitby from high above the sea. This useful tipping up of the earth’s surface served him well in the War (e.g. Air Fight over Portland) when he developed his uncanny ability to visualise a scene from an altered perspective. It serves to distribute detail more evenly and ‘democratises' the subject matter so it has equal weight, unlike the more usual perspective at ground level where near and far objects are very different sizes.