DESPUÉS DE LA LLUVIA

Christa Zaat

Benjamin Williams Leader (British painter) 1831 - 1923
Sunset after a Shower, 1876, 1887
oil on canvas
30 x 52 in. (76.2 by 132.1 cm.)
signed, dated and inscribed B.W. LEADER 1876 Retouched 1887 (lower left)
private collection

Catalogue Note
Benjamin Leader is famed for his sweeping vistas of the English countryside, and this picture, executed over a period of several years, demonstrates the artist at the apex of his painterly abilities. Though sunset was the favorite hour of the day for Leader, this work also magnificently shows the effects of a storm on a darkening sky; the roiling clouds and their reflection of light are at the heart of the picture’s power. A critic of the era, Lewis Lusk commented in 1901 on Leader’s ability to set a mood: “upon the drenched landscape at last bursts the sunshine, and the long hours of gloom end in a ruddy glow which foretells a fine morrow. There is evidently an allegory here also. It happens sometimes that a human life has to endure heavy storm and hard press until the day of its existence draws nigh to a close. And then the storm passes away, and the evening of life becomes filled with golden peace, and like these black trees, the somber past, thus illuminated with the mellow light, seems to have a mellow beauty of its own”(Lewis Lusk, ‘The Life and Work of B. W. Leader, R.A.,' Art Annual, 1901, p. 1)