拍品专文
In 1960 and 1961 Piper travelled to Yorkshire - to the cities of Leeds, Halifax, Sheffield and Huddersfield - making sketches on the spot, and then later a group of paintings. The present work shows St. Michael's Church (which has now been demolished) and Carr Mills, Buslingthorpe Lane. As David Fraser Jenkins writes:
'The colour dominates, overwhelming the details of the church and the factory, which are hardly there for their own sakes but for their surviving presence in a modern view. Leeds had depended on the fires of industry, and the church may be thought to have had a bit of a struggle to keep up with this, in its less striking blues and greens. But the shapes and colours in the painting are already more akin to those of the new architecture that will replace both church and factory. The large blocks of colour, reminiscent of modern French painting, seem to be suggesting something else that is not there, for the area as it existed is being seen in the light of the acceptance of the new building' (exhibition catalogue, John Piper in the 1960s and 70s, London, Agnew's, 2007, pp. 2-3).
We are very grateful to Dr. Rev. Stephen Laird for his assistance with preparing this catalogue entry.
'The colour dominates, overwhelming the details of the church and the factory, which are hardly there for their own sakes but for their surviving presence in a modern view. Leeds had depended on the fires of industry, and the church may be thought to have had a bit of a struggle to keep up with this, in its less striking blues and greens. But the shapes and colours in the painting are already more akin to those of the new architecture that will replace both church and factory. The large blocks of colour, reminiscent of modern French painting, seem to be suggesting something else that is not there, for the area as it existed is being seen in the light of the acceptance of the new building' (exhibition catalogue, John Piper in the 1960s and 70s, London, Agnew's, 2007, pp. 2-3).
We are very grateful to Dr. Rev. Stephen Laird for his assistance with preparing this catalogue entry.