Palm Tree

Sutherland first visited the South of France in 1947 and from then on spent part of each year there, buying a house at Menton in 1955. The landscape and vegetation were completely new to him and led to a preoccupation with Mediterranean motifs such as vine pergolas, palm palisades, cacti, banana leaves and cicadas. The shape of the spiky palm leaves had obvious connections with the thorn trees which he had been painting before and his colour palette changed to reflect the constant bright and warm climate of the Mediterranean.