Late Works: John Sell Cotman, John Martin and Samuel Palmer

With Tim Wilcox, art historian, author and independent curator

It is not only Turner and Constable who enjoyed a late flowering in their art. Samuel Palmer, John Sell Cotman and John Martin, all celebrated for their youthful energy and originality, brought wisdom and hard-won experience to their lesser-known final years.

John Sell Cotman: After a decade devoted to printmaking, Cotman returned to painting, only to meet with further disappointment and self-doubt. Uncertain whether to court the crowds in the exhibition rooms, or to find solace by burying himself in nature, Cotman’s daring technical experiments are a reflection of his wavering, restless personality.

John Martin: Martin’s early paintings of biblical disasters provided spectacle and entertainment for a British public buoyed by the ending of the Napoleonic wars. When this enthusiasm waned, Martin turned to other means of employment. Only in his final decade, encouraged to paint again by Prince Albert, did Martin recapture his panoramas of apocalyptic darkness and heavenly light.

Samuel Palmer: An artist now revered for work made before he was 30, Palmer almost despaired of ever rediscovering the immersion in God and Nature which pervaded his Shoreham period. A commission for a series of paintings based on Milton, which he spun out over 20 years, finally enabled to him to pour a lifetime’s joy and passion, grief and loneliness into a new glorious visionary world.

The event will take place online on Zoom and a link to join the event will be shared in advance by email.

Booking is essential and it is £21 for the entire course.