St Clare 1919

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale painted St Clare, and it looks like she used watercolors on paper or card. The surface is smooth, and the marks are delicate. You can see the artist layering the colours to build up a sense of depth in the garden, which is so full of detail. There's this sense of quiet labour; Clare is absorbed in tending to her plants. Look at the way Fortescue-Brickdale has rendered the water pouring from the watering can; it's almost translucent, a shimmering thread connecting the vessel to the earth. The artist makes the garden feel alive with colour, even though the palette is quite subdued. It's like a world within a world, full of gentle care and attention. It reminds me a little of some of the Pre-Raphaelite painters. They shared that fascination with the symbolic potential of nature, with beauty as a form of devotion. In the end, it’s all a conversation across time, isn’t it? We never really know what an artwork is *supposed* to mean, and that’s okay.