Watercolors by Eric Ravilious

I love how light is diffused through netting, glass, and leaves in these paintings by English artist Eric Ravilious (1903-1942). I recognize the light from nursery greenhouses and outdoor displays with shade netting where I  browse each spring. I also love the incidental beauty of plants under cultivation for use and sale rather than landscape decoration.

I think these paintings appeal to the child in me who loves enclosures that aren't our regular habitations--tree-houses, forts, tents, green-houses, odd little attic bedrooms.

I found this painting of a strawberry-bed under bird netting in EmilyBooks.

This greenhouse full of potted cyclamens and green tomatoes is at the Tate Gallery. This was the painting that put me on the Ravilious trail. The symmetrical arrangement of the passageway and growing things feels a little like folk art to me, though I doubt Ravilious had that in mind. That pale diffuse light, reflected on all the cyclamen leaves is so right on. And the tomato leaves are darker because that's how his eye saw them against the bright glass.

This greenhouse full of carnations is being sold as a print on Ebay. I love how the passageway with its warped posts, takes up most of the picture, how the carnations, full and abundant, are pushed to the sides. 

This attic bedroom can be seen at the Fry Art Gallery.

This Ravilious design for a mini-greenhouse can be seen at The Fine Art Society.

Watercolor flowers by Charles Rennie Mackintosh, part two

These are botanical studies from Mackintosh's sketchbook. They are airy and lightly finished, somewhat stylized. I love the spare pencil lines and how leaves and blossoms overlap without obscuring each other.

I found these at the The Hunterian Gallery at the University of Glasgow.

Watercolor flowers by Charles Rennie Mackintosh

When I came across this Charles Mackintosh watercolor on the Metropolitan Museum of Art website it pulled me up short. My heart didn't exactly skip a beat, but I did feel like everything stopped for a minute while this painting took hold. I love how the fluffy peonies and delicately veined leaves contrast with the sleek vase and the orange, patterned background. The silver vase speaks so clearly I hear it like a sweetly ringing bell or the pure tone of a flute. (That sounds high-flown and hyperbolic, but it's true. That silver vase gives me a cross-sensory experience that sounds like a flute in my brain.) 

So I looked for other Mackintosh watercolors. I found these pinks in Wikimedia Commons. I wonder if he designed their box.

I found this iris at TheGlasgowStory. I love how he captures gloss and reflections without belaboring them. He expresses the essence of shininess.

This watercolor of an autumnal looking rose is up for auction at MutualArt.com. Oh, those beautifully articulated rose petals and that luminous pallette! My birthday is coming up, you know.

Next week I plan to share some Mackintosh watercolors painted in a less finished style.  I found so many beauties I couldn't pass up, I decided they needed a separate post.

Sharing and reacting to art I find online has become my Sunday afternoon treat. I hope it's a treat for you too!

Lovely old illustrations

I love the clear, delicate lines; the graceful patterns of leaf and flower; the billowing curves and circles; and the soft colors on aging, brownish paper of these Paul Vincent Woodroffe illustrations. 

Go slow when you get to The Fairy Ship. It's my favorite.

I found these illustrations on the Metropolitan Museum of Art website. I wouldn't have known to look for them there if I had not first seen some of them at A Polar Bear's Tale, a blog full of beautiful and interesting images.