The Making of the English Landscape


Book Description

The classic text of English landscape history, ground-breaking and hugely influential.




English Landscapes


Book Description

From Penzance to Penrith, Talbot and Whiteman have explored the country region by region, documenting landmarks and scenery. They have put their unique talents to work to accurately convey the spirit of a place: whether it be the lush landscape, fine architecture and intriguing mythology of Wessex; the high peaks, wild fells, spectacular waterfalls and secluded valleys of the Lake District; or the wooded hills, open heathland and coastal plains of the southern counties. Rob Talbot's stunning display of landscape photography is perfectly complemented by Robin Whiteman's text which concisely describes every aspect of a region -- from its history, literary and artistic connections, to its geography, geology, architecture, agriculture and local customs.




The English Landscape Garden in Europe


Book Description

This book provides an overview of the extent to which the 18th-century English Landscape Garden spread through Europe and Russia. While this type of garden acted widely as an inspiration, it was not slavishly copied but adapted to local conditions, circumstances and agendas. A garden 'in the English style' is commonly used to denote a landscape garden in Europe, while the term 'landscape garden' is used for layouts that are naturalistic in plan and resemble natural scenery, though they might be highly contrived and usually large in scale. The landscape garden took hold in mainland Europe from about 1760. Due to the differing geopolitical character of several of the countries, and a distinct division between Catholic and Protestant, the notion of the landscape garden held different significance and was interpreted and applied variously in those countries: in other words, they found it a very flexible medium. Each country is considered individually, with a special chapter devoted to 'Le Jardin Anglo-Chinois', since that constitutes a major issue of its own. The gardens have been chosen to illustrate the range and variety of applications of the landscape garden, though they are also those about which most is known in English.




Uncommon Ground


Book Description

An enchanting visual glossary of the British landscape.







Landscape and Ideology


Book Description

In this interdisciplinary study, Ann Bermingham explores the complex, ambiguous, and often contradictory relationship between English landscape painting and the socio-economic changes that accompanied enclosure and the Industrial Revolution.




John Constable's Skies


Book Description

John Constable is arguably the most accomplished painter of English skies and weather of all time. For Constable, the sky was the keynote, the standard of scale and the chief organ of sentiment in a landscape painting. But how far did he understand the workings of the forces of nature which created his favourite cumulus clouds, portrayed in so many of his skies over the landscapes of Hampstead Heath, Salisbury and Suffolk? And were the skies he painted scientifically accurate? In this lucid and accessible study, John Thornes provides a meteorological framework for reading the skies of landscape art, compares Constable's skies to those produced by other artists from the middle ages to the nineteenth century, analyses Constable's own meteorological understanding, and examines the development of his painted skies. In so doing he provides fresh evidence to identify the year of painting of some of Constable's previously undated cloud studies.




The English Garden


Book Description

An introduction to the history of landscape gardening in Britain in the 18th century. Garden design in England was entirely reinvented during the eighteenth century. The strictly symmetrical gardens of the French Baroque were replaced by artificial landscapes that soon became almost indistinguishable from natural scenery. This ideal image of nature conceived by eighteenth-century English landscape gardeners still governs our notion of what constitutes a beautiful landscape today. The English Garden is a journey through the history of the English garden by introducing twelve of the most important, original, and beautiful private parklands in Britain, all of which can be visited today. On the way, readers learn how the new landscape garden was born out of a spirit of political opposition during the period.