Art Appreciation

Lawrence Gowing - Cherry Copse at Stock Close, near Aldbourne

Sir Lawrence Burnet Gowing (21 April 1918 - 5 February 1991) was an English artist, writer, curator and teacher.  Initially recognized as a portrait and landscape painter, he quickly rose to prominence as an art educator, writer, and eventually, curator and museum trustee.  As a student of art history he was largely self-taught.

                 Saint Jerome in His Study

This is an engraving of 1514 by the German artist Albrecht Dürer. Saint Jerome is shown sitting behind his desk, engrossed in work. The table, on the corner of which is a cross, is typical of the Renaissance. An imaginary line from Jerome's head passing through the cross would arrive at the skull on the window ledge, as if contrasting death and the Resurrection. The lion in the foreground is part of the traditional iconography of St. Jerome, and near it is a sleeping dog, an animal found frequently in Dürer's works, symbolizing loyalty.   (This is from Wikipedia).

Art historian Erwin Panofsky comments on the perspective:

'The position of the sight point, quite far off centre, strengthens the impression of a representation determined not by the objective law of the architecture but by the subjective standpoint of the spectator who is just entering – a representation which owes to precisely this perspective arrangement a large part of its peculiarly 'intimate' effect.'

Alec Smith