I have recently turned to my home city of Oxford for my subject matter, a city renowned for its architecture and famous scenes. I have taken these famous scenes, (Magdalen Bridge, The Botanical Gardens, Punts, The Bridge of Sighs, The Radcliffe Camera, The Oxford Skyline) and dispensed with the romantic view of them. Instead I have painted them as a passer by might glimpse them on their way to work.
The street lamp, the bollard and the barrier are as much a part of the scene as the classic building itself. The Oxford skyline doesn’t always appear in perfect sunlight, it is still there on a cold, stormy winter’s day. In winter the punts are all moored on the river, redundant. The Bridge of Sighs which teems with tourists through the summer months is a solitary and ignored sight in the winter months.
I hope my paintings make the viewer look at a familiar scene in a new light and in turn appreciate their own surroundings all the more.
Sarah Moncrieff
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