The Scratch Board

 Okay, I think I figured out how to do this: I’m going to look at Wright’s series of people reading letters by candlelight. Benedict Nicholson’s book has black and white reproductions for four such paintings, and I’ll use those for this post, but I’ll also include two in colour.

A Girl Reading Letter by Candlelight, with a Young Man Looking Over Her Shoulder. 1762. Oil on canvas, 27.5 x 35 in.

A Girl Reading Letter by Candlelight, with an Old Man Looking Over Her Shoulder. 1767. Oil on canvas, 28 x 36 in.

A Girl Reading Letter by Candlelight. 1772. Oil on canvas, size unknown.

Old Woman Reading Letter by Candlelight in the Company of a Young Girl. 1772. Oil on canvas, size unknown.

What are the common elements in these paintings:

1.) candlelight provides the (main/only?) light source
2.) the flame itself is hidden, obscured from view
3.) the light defines the forms, it shows us the fore- and mid-ground quite clearly, but obscures the background completely
4.) there are two figures: the reader in the foreground, the observer in the background
5.) the distance between the subject (the letter reader) and the viewer (us) is conversational, almost intimate, we’re just across a small table from them
6.) while the faces and pose of the readers are largely neutral, the second figures display an emotional response to the reader/letter (anger, sadness, joy, distress) and are in action (hand waving near face, rubbing eye, pointing up/towards own head, clasping own hands)
7.) the colour pallette is limited to dark neutrals except for the subjects faces and hands, which are warm tones
8.) with the exception of the final work, the composition is triangular

Next some sketches based on what I’ve learned…

Resources:

The title for this post, “very fine candlelight pieces” comes from a statement made about Wright’s work by James Northcote, an artist contemporary of Wright’s, quoted in W.T. Whitley’s Artists and Their Friends in England, 1700 - 1799, Vol. II.  London, 1926.

Nicholson, Benedict. Joseph Wright of Derby: Painter of Light, Vol. I and II. Hew Haven: Yale University Press, 1968. Plates 45: A Girl Reading a Letter by Candlelight, with a Young Man Looking Over Her Shoulder, 1762.

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