This is the last day of an exhibition by Kurt Jackson at Messums Gallery in Tisbury, it features a series of paintings he did in the area in 2019. I am hoping that if you click on the link, you will be able to see the whole exhibition of 30 paintings, even when it is no longer in the gallery. Coincidentally Kurt Jackson's grandparents lived in the area, and this proved the inspiration to come back and paint this beautiful area. This is what he says:
“Here in Wiltshire between Fonthill Bishop and Fonthill Gifford my maternal Grandparents settled pre-war to make a home and raise their family. The estate provided a house and employment. Amongst these gentle sloping fields, between the mature woodlands and around the lake my mother and her siblings took their first steps. The Fonthill Brook flows out of this lake as a clear chalk stream, channelled between banks of limestone, under and between dark alders and vertical reeds. The glinting flinty bed with its flowering flowing crowfoot and the watercress providing cover for trout and native crayfish. Kingfishers hunt here, caddis flies dance, all seems bucolic, as it should be.” Kurt Jackson, 2019
The exhibition is stunning, and looked fantastic in the long gallery at Messums, I visited with friends last Wednesday when it was really busy in the morning. We looked round the exhibition and picked out a few absolute favourites. I think 'The Big Alder' was my number one painting:
Closely followed by 'Damp morning, coot, moorhen, tufted duck, mallard'
There are very low resolution photos of the paintings on the website, so I have added mine, but it does mean I haven't taken them totally face on, and there are reflections.
Above a general view of a wall, and a close up of 'Morning Sunlight, full of life.' below
Here's an idea of what the gallery space looks like
This one below was 'Song Thrush signing to me, heat of the day'
This one was also fabulous, a few reflections appear half way down, it's called 'Dancing caddis, dancing water reeds'
Having seen the exhibition, I wanted to buy a catalogue, but they have sadly all sold out despite being reprinted, and I was keen to follow the 'Kurt Jackson Trail' to visit the places where he'd painted, there sadly wasn't one, so we made our own up! But not having taken the precaution of bringing an OS map of the area, we relied on Google maps to locate Fonthill Lake and the nearby Fonthill Brook, seen below not 5 minutes walk from the gallery:
We then walked north for a while, through the delightful town of Tisbury until we came across Fonthill Lake in the valley below. It's a long, thin lake created by damming the Fonthill Brook, and is in the grounds of what was Fonthill Abbey also known as Beckford's Folly after the man who built it. It now seems to be Fonthill Estate with a garden around the Manor open to the public. Fonthill Lake even has its own Facebook page, I searched in vain for a KJ selfie taken there!
I took a photo of the lake looking down from the dam:
and from the bank looking across:
There was also some information about the dam and how many houses the hydro electric power could supply, and a bit about the history of the area. It starts by saying 'Standing at this point in the mid 1820s, one would be looking across the dam at a 105 ft long 6 storey woollen mill driven by 3 water wheels and employing 200 people.' It's hard to imagine the place thronging with people, on the day we went, we met one dog walker.
I looked to see what else I could find about Fonthill Lake, and discovered a fascinating blog which recorded the fact that when the winter has been very dry, which it was last winter, concentrations of calcium and magnesium salts become high in the spring water feeding the middle of the lake. As the water warms up in summer, precipitation on these salts occurs and the water turns serpentine blue, this was recorded in June last summer, and can be seen in some of Kurt Jackson's paintings where there's a strangely bright blue colour, which I didn't really like at the time, but can see it was a true depiction of what was there. I'll take an example from the website:
He's called it 'Blue Fonthill Lake' obviously well aware of the phenomenon. I'm sure it was recorded in the catalogue. Maybe there will be another reprint?
Finally I'll include a photo of the OS map of the area, Messums is on the east side of Tisbury, I think where it says 'tithe barn'
“Here in Wiltshire between Fonthill Bishop and Fonthill Gifford my maternal Grandparents settled pre-war to make a home and raise their family. The estate provided a house and employment. Amongst these gentle sloping fields, between the mature woodlands and around the lake my mother and her siblings took their first steps. The Fonthill Brook flows out of this lake as a clear chalk stream, channelled between banks of limestone, under and between dark alders and vertical reeds. The glinting flinty bed with its flowering flowing crowfoot and the watercress providing cover for trout and native crayfish. Kingfishers hunt here, caddis flies dance, all seems bucolic, as it should be.” Kurt Jackson, 2019
The exhibition is stunning, and looked fantastic in the long gallery at Messums, I visited with friends last Wednesday when it was really busy in the morning. We looked round the exhibition and picked out a few absolute favourites. I think 'The Big Alder' was my number one painting:
Finally I'll include a photo of the OS map of the area, Messums is on the east side of Tisbury, I think where it says 'tithe barn'
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