Although it has been overshadowed by the COVID-19 crisis, 2020 is another important year for the English Lake District. It is the 250th anniversary of William Wordsworth’s birth and the centenary of Hardwicke Drummond Rawnsley’s death. The former is the well-known Romantic Poet Laureate, and the latter an Anglican priest and the founding member of the National Trust, who inspired Beatrix Potter concerning the importance of conservation. On her death, Potter bequeathed nearly all her property to the National Trust, including over 4,000 acres of land, sixteen farms, cottages, and herds of cattle and Herdwick sheep. It is commonly agreed that Wordsworth was one of the earliest environmental activists working to preserve the natural beauty of the English Lake District. Hardwicke Rawnsley, born a year after the death of Wordsworth, appears to have inherited the passion of the poet. These two men championed the conservation of natural beauty in the Lake District and beyond. Their voices echo all the more in our contemporary society.
For celebrating this commemorative year, I have launched my new art project “Wordsworth, Rawnsley and Lake District”, which is again supported by Arts Council England. I produced two portraits of each figure in the double-vision style, which proved a success during my previous art project “Conversation with Ruskin.”
The COVID-19 crisis disappointed my expectation to hold the exhibition of this project later this year. However, currently, the exhibition plan is under consideration for next summer.
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Portrait of Hardwicke Rawnsley
I portrayed Hardwicke Rawnsley in his early 30s when he first met the young Beatrix Potter at Wray in 1882 while he was working as a vicar of the St Margaret of Antioch parish church in Wray Castle, passionately talking to her about the importance of conservation.
Portrait of William Wordsworth
At the same time, William Wordsworth in his late 20s when he and his sister Dorothy settled at Dove Cottage. This event coincided around when Wordsworth started to write his autobiographical poem “The Prelude.”
Portrait of Hardwicke Rawnsley: Work in progress
With the assistance of the Arts Council England Emergency Response Fund, I have completed these works (apart from the drawings) with my unique brush hatching technique using Japanese sumi ink and acrylic, which I created and have developed over the past 15 years. It is inspired by the concept of designo, which was established in the Florentine School during the Renaissance, combined with neurological studies, which reveal that the human visual brain perceives objects predominantly by oriented lines.
Portrait of William Wordsworth: Work in progress
I completed all works with the gold background using acrylic gold paint inspired by the Japanese traditional painting style, such as Fusuma-e (sliding door painting) and Byōbu-e (folding-screen painting) for exploring my cultural roots. Thusly I pay homage to these important historical figures of the Lake District, in a way that is appropriate to their memory, despite, or even because of these challenging times.
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