Landscape with Rainbow, View near Chesterfield 

Curator: Editor: We’re looking at “Landscape with Rainbow, View near Chesterfield”, a watercolor and oil painting by Joseph Wright of Derby. It feels… dreamlike. Sort of washed-out, yet peaceful. What strikes you most about this work? Curator: The visible brushstrokes in what aims to be a naturalistic rendering, combined with the use of watercolor to create soft, almost hazy light, really brings the production to the foreground. It emphasizes labor, really. It isn’t so much a seamless depiction of nature, but the result of applying layers of material, specifically to get a certain mood or to highlight particular details, don’t you think? Editor: Yes, I see what you mean! It’s easy to think of landscape painting as just representing scenery, but this definitely reminds you of the artist’s hand. Curator: Exactly. How does the scene itself play into that perception, in your opinion? The composition, with its bridge and hinting at industrial life, it’s not just wilderness. How do those additions alter the landscape and the viewer's experience, or expectation of how nature should look like? Editor: Good point. The bridge seems to signify progress and human intervention. So maybe it shows how the materials used reflect a specific interaction between society and the natural world? Curator: Indeed. Perhaps watercolor itself, easily transportable and accessible, speaks to a particular class engagement with art and nature. It's not a grand oil painting destined for a palace, it is, in its own way, common to a different labor, wouldn’t you say? Editor: I never really considered the materials themselves could offer a story, but viewing Wright’s art through that lens gives such a broader understanding to it! Curator: Precisely. By thinking of art as a form of skilled work and analyzing its production means, we discover connections to the socioeconomic structures.