A View from Kelmscott: Paintings by John Lendis on View at Brantwood

This latest exhibition by John Lendis represents his fascination for John Ruskin and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. The series of paintings was produced after six weeks spent at Kelmscott in 2009, home of William Morris, founder of the Arts and Crafts movement. From being a child John Lendis has had a great interest in the Pre-Raphaelites. His varied career path has brought him full circle with his focus once again being the work of Morris and his companions.

After gaining a degree in textile art in Nottingham, Lendis spent a few years travelling, finally settling in Tasmania where he completed a Masters of Fine Art in Painting. He became an established artist in Australia, holding several exhibitions. Now back in England, Lendis has immersed himself in the paintings and ideas of John Ruskin and the work displayed at Kelmscott. He comments: "I find the abstract patterning of the landscape so interesting in Morris’s work and it seems to bring me closer to my initial training in fabric design….it is a form of landscape painting that has always deeply touched and inspired me.”  Visits to Brantwood, home of John Ruskin, have further inspired him: “I began to find out more about John Ruskin, about his attitudes to landscape and place. I found the vistas from the house filled with poignancy …..The view in wintertime from those remarkable windows seemed to fit with the culmination of Ruskin’s life, with his passion for landscaping the gardens, with his struggles to accord landscape painting a `rightful` place in the history of art. The paintings in A View from Kelmscott represent an accumulation, a synthesis, of all these experiences and influences.”

2 October–14 November 2010
Coniston
Cumbria LA21 8AD UK
015394 41396
brantwood.org.uk
www.brantwood.org.uk