View through a Window or Door

Many of Richard’s pictures have an extra dimension where we look from what is immediately in front of us through to another room or world. This is something he picked up from Renaissance paintings, before landscape was accepted as a subject in itself. Equally a window can frame someone leaning out or hint at someone doing something inside a building.

The Yellow Lamp (1985)

oil on board - 40.8h x 45.8w (cm)

The ‘ordinary’ scene of the room with a boy sitting reading becomes transformed by the expanse of sea through the window. So simple and yet so difficult to achieve!

Sea View (1950)

oil on board - 43h x 58w (cm)

This charming picture appeals to all ages, but maybe children in particular. It was painted after the exhibitions in the ‘40s for children and schools. However, Richard’s elder daughter Caroline was now 8 years old and he had also made and painted a folding screen making a sort of room within her room covered in delightful scenery. This picture seems to be a jewel-like encapsulation of that.

The Great Viol (1927)

pencil on paper - 31.9h x 25.9w (cm)

This painstaking drawing was in Richard’s first exhibition in 1929. The tipped perspective leads straight through the room and up through a diminutive back door opening onto a garden with a figure approaching. This is very reminiscent of Renaissance art, and all the detail does not overwhelm the basic clear structure of the drawing.

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Low Tide Through a Window (1991)