Jean Baptiste Camille Corot (1796-1875), Le Chemin montant sous les arbres à Ville-d’Avray, c.1874, oil on canvas, 18¼ x 15in (46.5 x 38cm). It is among the works on show at the Stoppenbach & Delestre exhibition Mapping Landscapes.
Works on show at the Stoppenbach & Delestre exhibition Mapping Landscapes.
Among the stand-out works at Stoppenbach & Delestre’s exhibition Mapping Landscapes is a c.1874 oil on canvas by Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot (1796-1875).
The gallery in St James’s, London, takes a sweeping look through the history of landscape painting in a show running until February 18.
It brings together works from the 19th to 21st century.
The firm specialises in Impressionist and Modern art and has compiled catalogue raisonnés on artists such as André Derain (1850-1954) and Charles-Francois Daubigny (1817-78).
Charles-François Daubigny (1817-78), La Plage de Berneval près de Dieppe, 1876, oil on panel 11 x 20in (29 x 49cm). It is among the works on show at the Stoppenbach & Delestre exhibition Mapping Landscapes.
However, this exhibition is the first in a series planned at the gallery that will take a closer look at Contemporary art alongside its modernist precursors.
As well as showing how approaches to landscape painting changed over the years, Mapping Landscapes also examines the connections that exist between works of the past and present.
Transitional figure
Corot makes an ideal figure for such a study. He is seen often as a transitional figure in 19th century history of art, with his work reflecting both the Neo-Classical tradition and anticipating the en plein air painting of the Impressionists.
Le Chemin montant… was painted towards the end of the artist’s life, and though it is a traditional figurative work, the brushstrokes seem immediate while the mood is withdrawn.
In an essay for the exhibition, artist and writer Jamie Limond compares Le Chemin montant… to much later works by the Scottish artist Carol Rhodes (1959-2018), another of the artists represented in the show.
She specialised in bird’s-eye landscapes altered by human industrial building. Her work would never be confused with Corot’s. But the man-made path in his painting is a distant precursor to her airports and factories. Both pictures have a touch of the enigmatic.
Also included in the show are works by Gustave Courbet, Andre Derain, Prunella Clough and Genevieve Asse. It is easy to see large changes over the course of time, the most obvious of which is the swing from the figurative (Charles-Francois Daubigny’s La Plage de Berneval près de Dieppe of 1875) to the abstract (Adrian Morris’ Landscape through a Circular Port III, 1967).
For the casual viewer the fun will be in drawing out the similarities between these varied pictures. For serious collectors it will be in choosing the best out of an attractive batch of major names.
Prices range from £10,000-250,000.
The gallery is a regular exhibitor at TEFAF Maastricht.
