"A Street in Brittany" by Stanhope A. Forbes

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A Street in Brittany

Stanhope Alexander Forbes (1857–1947)

1881

Oil on canvas

H 104.2 x W 75.8 cm

Collection: Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool

Accession number: WAG 509

"One of the first results of the visit to Cancale was a composition of figures in a narrow street: women in white coiffes and blue petticoats, grouped round their cottages and seated on their doorsteps engaged in their everlasting occupation of knitting blue jerseys for their fisher husbands (Birch 22). [Commentary continues below.]

Image downloaded, and caption and commentary added, by Jacqueline Banerjee. [Click on the image to enlarge it and mouse over the text for links.]

Kindly made available on the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike licence (CC BY-NC-SA), via Art UK.

Forbes's biographer continues, "It was a very simple motif, but painted with great care and conscientiousness, and with a close and searching attention to those truths of lighting and that clear out-of-door aspect which the painter sought to betray. It was interesting, too, as the first attempt Stanhope Forbes had made in what might be termed figure composition, if, indeed, a picture in which there is so little of arrangement in the grouping of the figures can be termed a composition. But it was, at any rate, a great step from simple portraiture, and its success — for it brought the young painter a very signal one — had the most marked influence in determining his future. Exhibited at the Royal Academy of 1881, it attracted favourable attention, and when, later on, it was sent to Liverpool, the Committee of the Walker Art Gallery decided to purchase it for their permanent collection" (Birch 22).

As an example of Forbes's work before he settled in Newlyn, this could hardly be bettered. However, there was one drawback to painting here, or so at least Forbes thought: "the painter began to find that a tendency in his work towards cold blue tones was perhaps being aggravated and encouraged by the invariable and somewhat monotonous colour of the Breton costume. Fearing to be led into an obvious mannerism, he came to the conclusion that a change of scene might be of advantage to his art and give him a fresh outlook" (Birch 23). The next chapter of his life was soon to begin, bringing with it more success, marriage, and a settled home in Cornwall.

Bibliography

Birch, Mrs Lionel. Stanhope A. Forbes, ARA, and Elizabeth Stanhope Forbes, ARWS. London: Cassell, 1906. Internet Archive. Contributed by the Kahl/Austin Foundation. Web. 2 March 2021.

Created 28 February 2021