From Samuel Palmer in 1830, through Sisley’s Terrace at Saint-Germain, to van Gogh’s pink orchards, a festival of Spring blossom.
van Gogh
Only the gods wore sandals in the ancient world. Then the state of your footwear told much about you, with fashion opting for the outrageously impractical.
Two paintings by van Gogh, and others show open fires and stoves heating homes and other places up to 1930.
Children on the cabbage patch, those toiling with the potatoes, digging beetroots, and a couple of unusual paintings with cucumbers and the true vegetable gardener.
Caillebotte’s gardening almost stopped him from painting, and Vincent van Gogh shows vegetable gardens on the hill of Montmartre.
An unusual pastel, a couple of fine nocturnes, then some reflections of figures from Caravaggio and Bonnard, concluded by coy self-portraits.
From the burning brands and oil lamps of the Greeks and Romans, to the soft light of candles, then in the 19th century came gaslights.
A French Impressionist, he painted alongside Pissarro and Cézanne, and was key in introducing Pissarro to Seurat and Neo-Impressionism.
City streets grew a lethal mixture of horse-drawn vehicles, trams, buses, and a few motor cars. But above them flew the pioneer aviators.
The experience of colour in our buildings, indoor environments, clothing and objects we look at has changed. What used to be a privilege of class is now all but universal.