28. Sir Frank Short
(1857-1945)

Moonrise on the Bure

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Moonrise on the Bure

Moonrise on the Bure

Mezzotint, 1922, 280 x 404 mm., Hardie 126. Very fine impression on chine-appliqué with large, full margins, signed in pencil. As a mezzotinter, Short would naturally have been fond of night scenes, mezzotint being the only print-making technique whose natural working is always from dark to light. Matters of sun and shadow, then, are sometimes replaced by the much subtler light of the moon and its effect on landscape. This is precisely what Short is working with here, its reflection on clouds, on water, on land, on parts of boats and even on the white shirt and hat of the evening fisherman. And one should note, at the left, the ripple in the water from something having just entered it, the slight raise of the ripple above the surface taking the moonlight more strongly. This kind of naturalistic study simply did not exist in mezzotint before Short. The Bure runs through the Norfolk Broads to Great Yarmouth and the East coast of England.