Art and Eye

Backbreaking labour is depicted in Millet's Man with a Hoe, the last of his most controversial peasant paintings which have subsequently been labelled as 'socialist' by a variety of writers. It sits among The Sower, which Robert Hughes referred to as 'the Mona Lisa of socialism', alongside The Gleaners and The Angelus all by the same artist, and some of which will be making an appearance at the upcoming National Gallery exhibition in London. At first glance, this sizeable canvas appears relatively simple in composition - an isolated figure against an earthy palette and limited grey sky, pushed to the very limits of human effort, whilst others labour in the background, secondary to the torturous scene in front of the viewer. Meanings range from political commentary, referencing the age of mass production in the mid nineteenth century, the growth of modern farming techniques and negation of the rural worker, to symbolic suggestions of the Man as a hero for the working...

It is the continued irony of stained glass that despite its public nature in churches around the world, it is still an art form that is neglected in exhibitions and critical scholarship. It is not art available to the public eye. Admittedly, displaying stained glass comes with its difficulties - works are created for their chosen spiritual or secular spaces, and they are not designed to be moved, whilst accompanying archival material is not always abundant. However, there is little excuse to be made for such a lack of scholarship on stained glass, from any exploration of larger London firms such as Lowndes and Drury, to decentralised narratives of art history which detail the schools around Birmingham or Manchester, to include specific artists. One such practitioner was A.J. Davies, whose window in Claverly Church, Shropshire, is an intriguing example of his later style.  Davies' window is complex, yet three main layers can be identified. The perspective is stacked, recalling many ...

  Two grasping, weathered men face the viewer, crammed into the space and pressing into the sides of the canvas in this uncomfortably close arrangement. This was a subject both Marinus van Reymerswale and his workshop repeatedly returned to during the mid sixteenth century. Detail is minute, precision is exact and realism is intense, as van Reymerswale offers us a successful comment on avarice, greed and materialism in his hometown.  Conservation by the National Gallery has revealed this painting to be a copy of a version now in the Louvre, identifiable through changes in the underpainting. A similar work, entitled The Moneychanger and his Wife sits in the Museo del Prado in Madrid. In the work from the National Gallery, van Reymerswale reuses figural types, costume and setting to illustrate two figures: the grasping tax collector on the right who sneers out towards the viewer, and the concentrating figure on the left, writing an account of the income of the town of Reymerswal...

  Standing eight feet tall, this anonymous, bronze character surveys the cliffs in Tintagel Island. Its name, Gallos, translates to 'power', yet visitors have rewritten the sculpture's history, even in its short lifetime, to associate the figure with the legend of King Arthur. With crown and prominent sword supporting an ephemeral weight, this is a figure who could certainly reference the tale of the sword in the stone, which only the rightful King of Britain could release. The figure's two bulky hands cross over the sword's pommel, furthering his claim over the weapon. In fact, this is a relatively stable part of the work, along with the cloaked face which is fully cast in bronze and contrasts the gaps and holes defining the sculpture more broadly. Crown and sword become the most prominent features, returning to the idea of power as the figure peruses the landscape and Atlantic Ocean beyond.  Bronze casting was a technique perfected since the Renaissance and came t...

  The monumental crucifixes of Cimabue, Giotto and their followers, and their transition from Byzantine forms towards increased dynamism and naturalism, have been well studied. Equally, smaller works by French Gothic practitioners in ivory are now beginning to permeate scholarship, mainly through the detailed exploration by Sarah Guerin. The goldsmiths of Siena do not command as much attention. Yet, they hold the key to artistic synthesis in the early fourteenth century. This is proved by the small processional crucifix currently at the National Gallery's iteration of Siena: The Rise of Painting 1300-50, attributed to Tondino di Guerrino.  Tondino combines enamel with an intricate gold sculptural presentation of the crucified Christ in this small, portable work. Instantly, the eye is drawn to the central element - the thin, skeletal body hanging from two stretched, emaciated arms. Christ's torso is drawn inwards, his ribs exposed, mimicking a sharp intake of breath. The downwa...

  Evelyn De Morgan constructed her chalk and pencil study from a richly coloured, highly detailed oil on canvas she called  Earthbound. Here, a grasping king swathed in orange and pinpricks of gold attempts to desperately claw at the last of his coins, whilst an angelic being swoops over him. In the distance, a lone figure bathed in light gestures up towards the ombre heavens, in an indication of the underlying religiosity of De Morgan's oil painting. None of this becomes evident, however, from her chalk and pencil study of two reclining figures. What is the purpose of exploring these preparatory sketches? Why are they important or useful? In the oil painting, De Morgan's miserly king is noticeably male, from his bushy grey hair and beard. In the chalk study, the artist has chosen a female figure in both instances, to work out her final composition, firstly in the nude before layering the draperies onto the figure. It highlights the constraints of the nineteenth century female...