Landscape Art selected by Alex Reynolds, Associate Director, Smith & Williamson
Landscape Art generally brings the images of Constable or Turner to mind with their idyllic and views of the countryside in a timeless era. For many years this was the typical view in any piece of landscape art.
However we have witnessed a change in our countryside through industrialisation and urbanisation. Now that more of the population lives in the city, so people’s everyday landscape is that of an urban sprawl. Whilst this can be striking, rarely is it idyllic or beautiful. Even in the countryside it is becoming harder to truly escape man’s influence either all around you or on the distant horizon.
This change of view and aesthetic is now represented in landscape art. Now artists are prepared to show us not only the reality of a rural landscape, but also images of the urban landscape that most of us see and live in every day. This is not necessarily an aesthetic view but more a realistic interpretation of the world around.