Cloud Study; Lake [Maggiore?] and Village (verso, from sketchbook) 1866 - 1869

Curator: What we have here is "Cloud Study; Lake [Maggiore?] and Village", found within a sketchbook by Jervis McEntee, created sometime between 1866 and 1869. It’s a striking pencil and charcoal drawing. Editor: My immediate thought is about the quiet stillness it evokes. The landscape seems to hold its breath. You can almost feel the heavy, moist air just before a storm. Curator: Absolutely. McEntee was working at a fascinating moment, grappling with how to represent landscape and experience amidst the complex socio-political tensions leading up to the Gilded Age. These were times of industrialization and vast changes to the landscape itself. Editor: So, this almost feels like a refusal of that headlong rush into modernity? A clinging to a simpler vision? Curator: Precisely. McEntee positions the viewer in this serene space, but knowing the context, you also get this quiet anxiety about the impact of "progress" on these environments, perhaps a romantic rebellion against the loss of natural beauty. Editor: I’m also thinking about who has access to this kind of idyllic scene, or maybe more pointedly, who is being dispossessed from it during this period? How is McEntee negotiating his position of privilege as he sketches this "untouched" landscape? Curator: That’s key. By framing the landscape this way, what histories are being erased or amplified? The lack of human presence – are they absent, or absent by design? How does his elite background enable and shape these artistic choices? The sketch then becomes more than a beautiful landscape— it’s a complex document of its time. Editor: It really makes you consider landscape not just as scenery, but as a space imbued with power and history. I appreciate how this subtle sketch opens up these larger discussions. Curator: It offers us a vital opportunity to reflect on our present moment, constantly reshaped by progress, inequality and dispossession. How can we challenge them?