拍品專文
Sea Shells is a smaller version of Albert Moore's 1874 entry to the Royal Academy, Shells in the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. This duplication process was common practice for Moore and his work from the 1870s includes several paintings that were similar in composition, but different in color and size. It has been suggested that this practice allowed him to experiment with different color combinations while reducing the time-consuming process he religiously followed of executing endless drawings and oil sketches for his figures, their poses, costumes and draperies--a system that took several months to create a finished painting that would satisfy his discerning eye (Victorian High Renaissance, exh. cat., 1978, p. 146).
Sea Shells shows a standing female figure wrapped from head-to-toe in a diaphonous drapery over a pale green robe. She is set against the horizontal bandings of a grey sea and sky, and walks on a moist, sandy beach scattered with shells and rocks. The wind of the ocean pulls at her drapery and stretches it around her left arm and leg while a loose piece of her gold-trimmed scarf is lifted in the air by the sea breeze. Sea Shells shows Albert Moore experimenting with, and successfully evoking motion in the billowing swirls of sheer drapery that envelope his beautiful, classical model. Moore's biographer, Albert Lys Baldry, recalled that Moore created a special fan in his studio that blew the draperies of his models and simulated the effects of wind on a beach (A. Baldry, pp. 83-84). The pose and head of the model in Sea Shells is derived from classical sources, reflecting Moore's study of antique sculpture.
Moore's skill as a colorist is brilliantly evoked in the simple, yet sophisticated palette of Sea Shells. The predominantly monochromatic color scheme of cream, beige, grey and tan blends with the soft green of the model's robe, with the only contrast being the bright coral of the shell that decorates her cap--a clever device that echoes Moore's practice of signing his works with a Greek anthemion instead of a signature.
It is not surprising that Albert Moore and James McNeil Whistler were friends and shared the same patrons--both artists have become celebrated for their subtle, yet highly sophisticated use of color usually applied as the costumes of the women they portrayed in their paintings.
Albert Moore died in 1893. He worked on his last painting, The Loves of the Winds and the Seasons until a week before his death.
Sea Shells shows a standing female figure wrapped from head-to-toe in a diaphonous drapery over a pale green robe. She is set against the horizontal bandings of a grey sea and sky, and walks on a moist, sandy beach scattered with shells and rocks. The wind of the ocean pulls at her drapery and stretches it around her left arm and leg while a loose piece of her gold-trimmed scarf is lifted in the air by the sea breeze. Sea Shells shows Albert Moore experimenting with, and successfully evoking motion in the billowing swirls of sheer drapery that envelope his beautiful, classical model. Moore's biographer, Albert Lys Baldry, recalled that Moore created a special fan in his studio that blew the draperies of his models and simulated the effects of wind on a beach (A. Baldry, pp. 83-84). The pose and head of the model in Sea Shells is derived from classical sources, reflecting Moore's study of antique sculpture.
Moore's skill as a colorist is brilliantly evoked in the simple, yet sophisticated palette of Sea Shells. The predominantly monochromatic color scheme of cream, beige, grey and tan blends with the soft green of the model's robe, with the only contrast being the bright coral of the shell that decorates her cap--a clever device that echoes Moore's practice of signing his works with a Greek anthemion instead of a signature.
It is not surprising that Albert Moore and James McNeil Whistler were friends and shared the same patrons--both artists have become celebrated for their subtle, yet highly sophisticated use of color usually applied as the costumes of the women they portrayed in their paintings.
Albert Moore died in 1893. He worked on his last painting, The Loves of the Winds and the Seasons until a week before his death.