It went through my hands about 30 years ago. I bought it from Philip Son and Neal at the top of Bond Street (now Bonhams).
They didn’t know the artist and I bought it purely on quality. A fabulous, lyrical depiction of English rural life.
I look forward with interest to reading all suggestions of who it might be by.
John Robertson
(Retired: Bourne Gallery, Reigate)
My personal pick
The lovely painting has a look about it which reminds me of Devonshire and the Blackdown Hills, associated with Robert Bevan, Spencer Gore and others.
The countryside with its scattered, perhaps thatched houses and the winding empty road, take me to my 90-year-old sister’s farm down there, where she still has a fragment of a cider apple orchard, with old barns with their clay tinted cob walls.
Could the artist be Harold Harvey (1874-1941)?
A tricky task picking cider apples with wobbly heavy wooden ladders, but if the apples fall it does not matter if they bruise for cider making, but if the sow was out with piglets speed was of the essence!
David Evans
Aquitaine
Bateman suggestion
Try James Bateman (1893-1959), who studied at Leeds School of Art and Slade School of Art, then taught at Cheltenham School of Art, and painted Cotswold landscapes.
Peter Newcombe
