Villefranche 1865

This watercolor and graphite drawing of Villefranche was created by Edward Lear on January 15th, 1865. Lear, a 19th-century artist known for his travel sketches and nonsense poetry, often depicted landscapes with a delicate, almost dreamlike quality. Consider the cultural context of the Victorian era, a time when travel became more accessible to the middle class, fueling a desire for picturesque scenes of faraway places. But also remember that tourism was an experience often shaped by colonial power dynamics and class privilege. Lear's work invites us to reflect on how perceptions of landscape are intertwined with social and economic forces. How do we grapple with the tension between the personal experience of beauty and the awareness of historical power structures that shape our perceptions? Lear's delicate rendering of light on the water invites us to contemplate our relationship with nature and history.