Buttercup Field

Dad lived in the New Forest and there was a lot of artistic interest in gypsies there. Augustus John near Fordingbridge was living a gypsy life and a bit later Sven Berlin settled near Lyndhurst amongst the gypsies at Shave Green.

This painting has a strange feeling about it as if there is some spiritual significance there. A monumental gypsy woman sits on a bank at the edge of the buttercup field holding a baby and at her feet is a basket of flowers already staring to droop. The boy behind her is perhaps picking some more for her. But the woman stares straight ahead of her as if she is thinking of other things. 

In the same year Dad painted La Fête des Saintes Maries de la Mer depicting the gypsy celebration in the Camargue where statues of the saints are borne into the sea celebrating Sara, patron saint of the gypsies. In his picture, flowers are strewn in the sea. May is the height of the buttercup season and the gypsy ritual takes place on the 24th and 25th of May.