Drypoint. An enclosed formal garden with a zigzag path leading to tall hedges in the distance. In the left half of the composition are cypress trees and a single tree stump. In the right foreground are the bare trunks and crooked branches of two tall trees, one in front of a stone wall that traverses the image, the other behind it; there is another curved tree stump in that area. The sky is filled with clouds. A framing line has been ruled 5 mm from the plate mark at the top and at both sides of the plate.
The clouds at left have been burnished, and extensive burnishing has been applied to the lawns and paths; this serves to lighten the overall tonality of the image. Curved lines of shading have been added to the tree beyond the wall, and oblique shading has been introduced to the top of the left stump.
Much new drypoint has been added to the grassy areas, to the path in the foreground and at right, to the previously untouched area between the tall cypresses, and to the tree stump at left. The clouds have again been darkened with drypoint. There are three variant impressions of this state.
Oblique drypoint strokes now shade the expanse of lawn in the middle distance. Further hatching has been added in the lower left corner.
- Catalogue Number
- E.163
- Title and Date
- Distant garden
2010–11
- Description of Featured Image
- An enclosed formal garden with a zigzag path that leads to tall hedges in the distance. In the left half of the composition are cypress trees and a tree stump. In the right foreground are the bare trunks and crooked branches of two tall trees, one in front of a stone wall that traverses the image, the other behind it; there is another curved tree stump in that area. The sky is filled with clouds. A framing line has been ruled 5 mm from the plate mark at the top and at both sides of the plate.
- Where Made
- Alphington, Melbourne
- Medium Category and Technique
- Intaglio Print: Drypoint and burnishing on copper
- Support
- Wove paper. Identified papers: Cream Somerset paper; white Arches paper with watermark: ‘ARCHES / FRANCE’ with infinity symbol; white Somerset paper with watermark: ‘somerset / ENGLAND’.
- Dimensions
-
Image size: 268 x 336 mm
Matrix size: 271 x 339 mm - Artist’s Record Number
- RAE.196
- Printer(s) and Workshop(s)
- All state impressions printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Edition printed by Rosalind Atkins at Kate Herd’s studio, Alphington.
- Summary Edition Information
- Five states. Edition of ten numbered impressions, 2011.
- Exhibitions
- Art Gallery of South Australia 2016–17: Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, Rick Amor: Contemporary Romantic, 2 December 2016 – 30 April 2017 [no catalogue].
- Literature
- For an illustration of the watercolour Distant garden, 2010, see Liverpool Street Gallery, Rick Amor – Watercolours and Paintings 2011 (exh. cat.), Liverpool Street Gallery, Sydney (in association with Niagara Galleries, Richmond, Victoria), 2011, cat. no. 7.
- For an illustration of the painting The distant garden, 1999, see Niagara Galleries & Tony Palmer, Rick Amor Paintings 1999 (exh. cat.), Niagara Galleries, Richmond, Victoria, and Tony Palmer, Double Bay, NSW, 1999, cat. no. 11.
- Collections
- State Library of Victoria, Melbourne: seven state impressions, numbered 1-1 through 1-5, 2-5, 1-6, dated 2011; bon à tirer impression, dated 2011; ed. 3/10, dated 2011.
- Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide: AP, dated 2011 (promised gift).
- Comment
E.163 is based loosely on a photograph taken by Amor of one of the gardens at Hampton Court Palace. According to the artist’s intaglio record books, this drypoint is the last intaglio print begun in 2010, although no impressions inscribed with that date have been found. The print is one of a cluster of closely related works, including a watercolour that was made after it (Liverpool Street Gallery 2011).
The essential details of the composition of E.163 were recorded in the first state and did not alter substantially as Amor progressed to the fifth and final state. All work done on the plate in states II through V was tonal. The clouds were modelled with a burnisher in the second state so as to relieve their initial uniformity, and parts of the path were darkened with drypoint in the fourth state. With these and other adjustments, the garden took on a darker and more enclosed appearance.
The artist has said that gardens and hedges figure large in his imagination, a reflection of deeply rooted childhood memories of his aunt’s house in Frankston, with its tall cypress hedge, which seemed to the young Rick Amor to cast a mysterious atmosphere over the place. The evocative gardens at Mulberry Hill (Langwarrin South, Victoria), the home of Sir Daryl and Lady Joan Lindsay, where Amor lived from 1973 to 1985, feature in many of the emotion-filled works that he made during his final years there. Since then, the subject of gardens is one that Amor has continued to return to from time to time.
- Keywords
- England, Gardens, Hampton Court gardens
- URL
- https://catalogue.rickamor.com.au/works/intaglio/distant-garden/
Record last updated 17/02/2021