Tuesday 17 March 2015

THE FIRST BUDS OF SPRING




The First Buds of Spring
watercolour, 25 x 16 inches, signed and dated 1885
Lionel Percy Smythe 

It is still very cold here but the first buds of Spring are opening bringing us hope that soon winter really will pass. It has been a mild Winter overall, with snow only coming in small amounts in January and February.

Countryside Info website
 
I've been in the Cotswolds for a week with friends. Driving through the villages and up Cleeve Hill the hedgerows were dotted underneath with the pale creamy blooms of wild primroses. I love seeing this wild flower and much prefer them to the more vibrantly coloured hybrids which people put in baskets. According to the excellent website, 'Countryside Info', "The Primrose (Primula vulgaris) is native to Britain and Europe. It  is a small plant, typically no more than 10 cm (4") high. It produces flowers which generally vary in colour from pale cream to deep yellow." There is also a pale pink variation which is rarer than the yellow. 

Blackbirds are everywhere gathering food for their young, when we drove at dusk we slowed right down for them because they fly very low from hedge to hedge across the road.


Before our holiday I visited one of my favourite art galleries and came across a catalogue from 2000 which caught my eye. The cover had the most exquisite watercolour on it, of a young girl in a wood with a blackbird in the bush beside her. The composition is soft and luminous and somehow conveys an air of melancholy. I found it quite poignant, the young girl perched on the brink of womanhood, and the Spring, both poised to bloom.

I'd been shopping all day and my bags and baskets were full but I had to have this. It was only a few pounds. I set off weighted down with my captures of the day towards the car.

Royal Albert Primrose Hill teacup

Once home and fortified by a cup of tea in a pretty cup I looked more closely at the catalogue and read the entry about this watercolour. The painting is called, 'The First Buds of Spring' and is by Lionel Percy Smythe (1839-1918). Lionel was the son of the 6th Viscount Stratford. He spent his early years in France before his family returned to settle in London in 1843. He trained in London and some of his paintings were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1863. Smythe and his wife made their home in Normandy, first at Wimereux (where the artist had spent his summer holidays as a child) and, from 1882 onwards, at the Château d’Honvault, between Wimereux and Boulogne. 
 
Lionel was a student of nature and he often portrayed the woods and fields of the countryside where he lived. His work was popular with a small following of collectors in England and became associated with 'The Idyllists',  a group of Victorian artists and illustrators which included Frederick Walker and John William North.  His work is represented in the collections of the Tate and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.
 
This piece is one of a series which Smythe painted using the woodlands around his home as a backdrop to a young girl pushing through a thicket in Spring time. The model was his daughter Norah, known as Noe. One of the compositions, 'A Wood Nymph' was exhibited in 1884. I have been unable to find an image of that painting, with that name, but the catalogues states that it is, 'surely close in composition to the present picture with its 'silver velvety bud of the willow palm' and 'a blackbird preening itself'. I wondered if this could have also been named 'Springtime', as this painting is so similar to the description and Noe is also the model here.
 
Lionel Percy Smythe
 'Springtime',
possibly also known as 'A Wood Nymph'
And there is one other painting which I located, entitled 'Bramble' which has the same composition but the girl is dark haired.
Lionel Percy Smyth
Bramble
His paintings of farm and seashore workers and children picking flowers and playing have magic about them although they often portray quite common circumstance. Stephen Ogden Fine Art sums this up in their bio entry of the artist when they say that, writing in 1910, one scholar noted of the artist that ‘Mr. Smythe proves plainly that a man may be as realist and still retain his poetic sense; that he may record the life about him faithfully and convincingly and yet miss none of its poetry, none of its imaginative suggestion, and none, certainly, of the beauty it may happen to possess.’
 
The Chris Beetles catalogue entry ends thus, "Its suggestion of melancholy is given poignant emphasis by the knowledge that Noe developed pleurisy in 1897, and died of tuberculosis a year later, before her 13th birthday'.

I have fallen in love with his work, and with this beautiful girl who lit up his paintings.  I hope to see some of his pieces in galleries when I am feeling better and can travel again.

Lionel Percy Smythe
Playmates
(love the flower collar on the dog)


Credits :

Stephen Ongpin Fine Art HERE:

Chris Beetles Art Gallery

Royal Albert China

30 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. It is a lovely dog, I knew you would like it! I would love to have one like this. x

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  2. Such lovely paintings! Flower collar is a sweet detail!






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  3. Life often looked blissfully idyllic in these Victorian paintings but so often it was tinged with sadness as you suggest here.
    The pale lemon of the primroses look so pretty along the banks and hedgerows at this time of year. The flower is edible and can be sugared to be used on cakes, and looks particularly lovely on cakes for Easter.

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    1. Rosemary, This is so true, especially the paintings of children. Thank you for that information about primroses. I know that they were gathered in Victorian times, and now I know that it was not just for their pretty blooms! x

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  4. Dearest Leeann and Mrs. Black the shoppe keeping cat....HELLO! Oh what a beautiful post you have for me today, as I too have a spring that is not quite warm! We had a very rough winter again with subzero temperatures for days. But this past weekend was a wonderful 60+ F degree weekend, but today was back in the 30s. So I can understand the grey and cooler temperatures you must endure. But this hope we have, it's like a seed. We embrace this art and beauty of the tiny buds timidly appearing...what a life this is, isn't it! And you were in the Cotswolds? Oh how I dream of seeing this place. I've been in France and Italy, but England is my next stop.

    Thank you so much for coming to visit me. It gives me great joy to post again, and I will yet again when I get my book into another phase. You are so kind. I will be back to catch up! HUGS, Anita

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    1. Anita, Thank you so much for this kind comment, lovely to see you back! Chat soon. x

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  5. I have never heard of this painter, but I like his work. It is not challenging but has a really delightful period charm. I hope you're better soon. I love Chris Beetles gallery - must be one of the best.

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    1. Jenny, I must visit Chris's gallery more often. Yes, Smythe's work, like many Victorian painters, is not challenging, but it is soothing. Sometimes we need different things from art and we are blessed to have so much to chose from. x

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  6. Dearest LeeAnn,
    Happy for you that the first blooms of spring are showing up. Love the Primrose, we had them in Italy in the woods in the wild in March and that was so lovely while living there...
    ENJOY! Sending you warmth and sunshine,
    Mariette

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  7. How enchantingly lovely! There is such a powerful elegance and surge of joy that comes with spring's return. We're teetering on the edge of it here and I feel as though I could almost reach out and touch it, like a bud itself. Any day now, any glorious, sun-kissed day!

    Wishing you a resplendent spring & sending many thanks your way for your lovely comment on this week's new vintage outfit post.

    ♥ Jessica

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    Replies
    1. Jessica, Love those outfits you just posted! Spring is coming .....

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  8. Ah, the peace of the countryside! <3

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    1. Laura, It is wonderful to be surrounded by birdsong .... but every once in awhile I long for the bustle of the city.

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  9. Charming pictures. They remind me of bits of my childhood, wandering in the woods. Nice to see your signs of spring--we still have snow on the ground!

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    1. Jen, The woods always take me right back to my childhood. Although we have signs .... it is still very cold here. But the snow is gone. x

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  10. Your days in The Cotswolds sound delightful! Love the paintings. Was Lionel Percy Smythe a Pre raphaelites? They look really romantic!

    Have a good weekend!

    Madelief x

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    1. Smythe was not a pre-Raphaelite, he was a part of a movement known as 'Idyllists'. They painted family life, country scenes and working people in a manner which made them more romantic than perhaps they really were. I love his soft colours and brush stroke. x

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  11. What a lovely and interesting post! The catalogue you found looks like a real treasure and Lionel Percy Smythe ... a new to me artist. So sad about his daughter. His watercolors are beautiful, so serene. I love your Royal Albert Primrose Hill teacup. I love teacups with scenes and haven't found one for me yet, but I keep looking! Hope you enjoyed your week with friends. Feel better!!!

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    1. Hi Snap, Thank you, I love Royal Albert Primrose too, but alas, that teacup is not mine. I hope a beautiful china teacup with images finds you. x

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  12. What beautiful images! I've not heard of Lionel Percy Smythe but his work reminds me a bit of Maxfield Parrish - ethereally expressive images of women in nature - lovely!

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    1. Amanda - YES! Maxfield Parrish, me too! I love Parrish and grew up with posters of his work. There was even a clothes shop in San Francisco which sold softly hued leathers named after him. x

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  13. There is something about this time of year with uplifting sense of freshness, pleasant surprises, and hope. Lionel Percy Smyth is new to me, thanks for the introduction. Your tea cup is perfectly lovely.

    Yoko

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    1. Thank you! Lovely to hear from you. I hope it is warmer there than it is here! x

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  14. I was entranced by the painting and took a bit of time to examine it, thinking even before I read your post that here was a painting of a young girl almost a woman. So sad to read she did not grow up and grow older.

    I love primroses too and although they don't grow wild in our part of the world , they have begun to grow wild around our home because I have planted so many over the years. It is cheery to see them blooming now in places I did not originally plant them !

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    1. Kathy, You have a perceptive eye. There is something haunting about the portrait of his daughter. I'm so glad that you have Primroses to enjoy - and well done for letting them seed wild around your home. x

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  15. Thoroughly beautiful post, LeeAnn. Smyth's work is so evocative and deeply beautiful. It conjures up the past, one's own youth, and an idyllic state of loveliness and serenity mingled with pleasant adventure that most of us are always seeking.

    ♥ Jessica

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    Replies
    1. Such a thoughtful comment - I'm glad that you enjoyed this. x

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