PROVENANCE Mr Hugh Scudamore, 1972 Alan Rowe, London, England, 1974 International Art Centre, 1975 Fran Cornes Collection, Wellington, 1976 Private Collection, Christchurch, 1978 Fine New Zealand Paintings, Jewellery & Decorative Arts, Webb's 06/04/2005 Trevor & Elizabeth Steiner Collection

EXHIBITED Frances Hodgkins European Journeys 4 May 2019 - 1 Sep 2019 Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki

ILLUSTRATED Figure 6.22 Frances Hodgkins European Journeys, Catherine Hammond and Mary Kisler p. 43 Pastorale: The Pursuit of an Image in Paintings by Frances Hodgkins, Linda Gill, Bridgehill Books, 2015

REFERENCE Frances Hodgkins database number FH0914 completefranceshodgkins.com

When Frances Hodgkins arrived at the farm of La Pastorale, near St Jeannet, at the beginning of December 1929, she was overwhelmed by the environment. She wrote to Arthur Howell, St Georges Gallery; 'I have been in this astounding place for 10 days - it is such a staggering change from London fog & gloom that I am getting down to it only now. Really it is so lovely upon on this misty mountain where the air is like wine and the wine like champagne. All is lovely all is peaceful not even the faintest whiff of a neighbour to spoil the absolute charm of the place. There is work enough for a life time...' After Christmas, she moved into St Jeannet itself, as she was beginning to miss human company as well as the offer of a cooked meal at the only inn. The village clings to the side of a terraced valley that rises from the sea miles to the Alpes Maritimes, the tall stone houses dwarfed by the great rocky outcrop, known as the baou.

The watercolours that resulted from this period are dominated by combinations of delicate lilacs, pinks, and mauves, reflecting the soft seasonal tones of the mountains before the summer sun returned in its vigour. Tucked among the rocky outcrops and winding lanes lay tiered groves of olives and grapes among patchwork fields, lined with walls built from the rocks cleared from the ground. Other patches of ground contained vegetables or graze a few sheep, goats or cows, and Hodgkins was fascinated by shards of pottery that indicated centuries of cultivation.

When painting The Summit (St Jeannet), Hodgkins has positioned herself down in the valley, so that the baou looms above the village, the deep channels on the face of the rock appearing from a distance like columns on an ancient temple. Created once it was warm enough to paint out of doors, her leafy trees rise like giants to the height of the mountain, their weeping foliage like so many dancers celebrating the rites of Spring. Their thrusting trunks anchor the composition and seem to embrace the tall pink buildings in their midst. The artist introduces a patterning effect by dabbing on pigment with brush point, a favoured technique that became a leitmotif in her Mediterranean paintings. Light ochres, greens and blues draw our eye back and forth among the different tiers of land that rise from the foreground, their differing foliage like emblems in a richly embroidered tapestry.

MARY KISLER