‘Britain is part paradise, part tip, part ravishing, part ravaged.’
David Gentleman’s Britain was the first of six large format art based travelogues written by one of Britain’s most successful and prolific artists of the last sixty years. First published in 1982 by Weidenfeld & Nicholson, the book ran to 224 pages and covered the length and breadth of the British Isles and like his later book, David Gentleman’s Coastline took the reader to some of the country’s lesser known places.
By the time of publication, Gentleman was already a well established artist who had produced a number of designs for the Royal Mail as well as an illustrator of many books, posters and publicity campaigns. These commissions invariably meant travel home and abroad which doubtless gave him the inspiration for these travelogues.
What is particularly fascinating for me about this book is the time it was written, Britain was in a period of radical transformation under the Thatcher government which saw an increasingly affluent South of the country leave a Midlands/North trailing behind. Old countryside traditions were still present but gradually being replaced by mechanisation and Gentleman captured both sides of the coin.
‘I also discovered more precisely than before the visual differences between England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland and I began to realise how quickly the face of Britain was changing through new farming methods, industrial decline, the growth of tourism, the prosperity of the south and the decline of the north. One may sense these things vaguely and instinctively, but drawing and writing make one think them out carefully and thoughtfully’
His sketches of market fairs (above) offer a prime example, he was as much about capturing people as part of the landscape as he was the landscape itself. Gentleman produced much of his work in situ, he used a camera when he needed to look back at a specific detail or colour in his studio but most of what you see in this book was at least sketched out at that place and that sense of authenticity comes through in the dramatic skies, seas and fields he captured.
Like Paul Hogarth who started slightly before him, Gentleman was well read, be it literature or politics and his view of place and people was well grounded. Like his other books on London, Paris, India and Italy, he gives an honest, impartial view of what he saw. Britain, despite its small size has a varied and rich landscape steeped in history and tradition and this book captures much of that from simple ink sketches to more complex watercolours.
I particularly enjoy his ink drawings and the simplicity of them, he seems to be able to say so much in them and I admire his confidence in publishing what, on the face of it would appear a quick sketch rather than an attempt to continually impress his peers with more elaborate pieces. On the section in Ireland he drew a simple sketch of a police riot van and a man being searched at a checkpoint which spoke volumes of the situation at that time.
This then is a wonderful account of Britain in the very early 1980s, much of it as relevant today as it was then. It’s an honest account of a country most of those who live here would agree with and recognise.
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Categories: David Gentleman
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