Back Garden 1938

Prudence Heward made this painting, Back Garden, with oil on canvas, and what strikes me is how present her hand feels in this piece. There's a real sense of the painting having been built up, layer by layer. I imagine Heward outside, squinting, trying to capture the light as it bounces off the houses and the riot of greenery in between. The colors feel almost Fauvist – that bright turquoise house is particularly juicy – but there's also a groundedness in the way she renders the forms. It's like she's saying, "Yes, I see the world in these intense colors, but I also know the weight and shape of these buildings, these plants." Look at how she's rendered that fence. Each stroke feels deliberate, carefully placed to create a sense of depth and texture. I bet Heward was inspired by those Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painters who were also trying to find new ways of capturing the world around them. We're all just riffing off each other, trying to make sense of this crazy, beautiful thing called life.