Sheep 1904

William Sidney Cooper made this oil painting, "Sheep," at an unknown date. Look at the fur; each sheep looks as though it has had its coat sculpted rather than painted, capturing their woolly essence! Cooper's mark-making feels very deliberate here, not random. The overall tonality is soft, like a warm memory. A sleepy, sun-drenched afternoon is evoked with a hazy, muted light. If you study the painting closely, you can see how Cooper creates depth through subtle shifts in tone and detail; for example, the texture of the grassy bank in the mid-ground that slopes down towards the beach. The green is broken up with browns and yellows. These details draw us into the pastoral scene. Cooper was a prolific landscape painter, and this piece is typical of his wider oeuvre. Like many of his contemporaries, such as John Constable, he had an affection for rural scenes, finding beauty in the everyday. It embraces ambiguity, inviting us to bring our own experiences and interpretations to it.