Snowdon on the Bangor Road about 7 Miles form Carnarvon. Verso: Sketch 

Curator: This is Nicholas Pocock's watercolour, "Snowdon on the Bangor Road about 7 Miles form Carnarvon," held at the Tate. Editor: It feels unfinished, almost dreamlike. I’m drawn to the raw texture of the paper and how it interacts with the washes. Curator: Note how Pocock uses delicate washes of colour and layered forms to create depth and suggest the scale of the landscape. The composition is very deliberate. Editor: I wonder about the paper itself. Was it handmade? What were the social conditions of its production? The translucency of the watercolour allows us to see through its layers. Curator: Indeed. The lightness gives a sense of immediacy, of capturing a fleeting moment. Editor: And that speaks to the changing perceptions of landscape at the time. I see the beginnings of a romantic sensibility in the way Pocock utilizes those light, almost ephemeral materials. Curator: A fascinating glimpse into both artistic and material practices of the period. Editor: Precisely. Something about its very incompleteness hints at the labor inherent in its making, and its relation to place.