Raymond Sheppard and architecture in oils

 

Houses and road

I'm taking the easy way out this month - it's a busy month even for retired people! I present oil paintings by Raymond Sheppard on the theme of rural architecture. It's obvious that Sheppard was no slouch when it came to practice. many holiday destinations are represented in the collection of his work and in various media too. 

In "Houses and road" and in others below the oil painting looks unfinished, yet it captures a certain light in the countryside. In "Houses, road and bushes" below we see again the keen eye on perspective being correct and the consequent shadows in the right places.

Houses, road and bushes

Round tower chimney(?) on  a house

The house above is so unique to my experience but after many fascinating hours spent reading about central Lake District chimneys, I'm still no closer to knowing where this is/was. The "Farm buildings" below have a wonderfully simple looking perspective with varying textures and colours. Also if you look closely I think the garden wall wraps round a corner downhill.

Farm buildings

I wondered what attracted Sheppard to the "House and lane"? It's a simple rural setting with a lean-to and a distinctive diagonally falling drainpipe.Again this looks to be a practice piece, capturing the feeling and light very well.

House and lane

Red house and trees

The image above and the one following have their own charm. Sheppard has raised the horizon in "Red house and trees" and lowered it for the view of the farm buildings in East Grinstead - and beautifully executed a rural setting.

Farm buildings, East Grinstead

French village, lane, hill

I couldn't discover where the image above was painted, so if anyone recognises this distinctive 'tower' please do let us know. Meanwhile the challenge for a fanatic like me is where in Naunton did Sheppard stand when observing the houses on the hill here? I love the curving perspective and would love to photograph it and compare what it looks like now.

Naunton, Cotswolds

Finally I love old farm buildings and the one below comes from South Mimms which is most famous now as the place (of a services on the M25) where Margaret Thatcher officially opened the London circular the M25, on 29 October 1986, where she cut a ribbon, officially making it Europe's longest ring road.

But the farm store below has all that fascinating detail of the boards, the stored machinery and clutter plus Sheppard must have spotted the sloping structure as the perspective works to demonstrate this.

Barn in South Mimms

 As we have visited the Cotswolds early in this article I had to share the following even though it's a pencil drawing and not an oil. 

Snowshill, September 1932

I'm not sure why, but the perspective curve of the houses and the wall opposite just get me so excited. They are drawn to perfection. And in this case I was able to use Google Maps - until I personally can photograph the scene - and found the street very easily. Snowshill is so small it won't take you minutes to find the scene - Google map location. You can see it hasn't changed a lot - beyond cars being parked there.