Audio description: 
Kerris Quarry by Samuel John ÔLamornaÕ Birch
Penlee House Gallery & Museum

The painting in front of you is a large, oil-on-canvas called Kerris Quarry, by Samuel John ÔLamornaÕ Birch.  It is about a metre and half tall by almost 2 metres wide, or 4 and a half foot tall by 6 foot wide.  It dates from 1937 and shows a flooded quarry and its deserted buildings and machinery.  The quarry is set within a landscape of fields and moorland with a glint of distant sea beyond.  Kerris Quarry is near Sheffield, a small hamlet close to the village of Paul, and is no longer a working quarry.  

The viewpoint of the painting is looking down into the quarry from an elevated position.  A roughly horse-shoe-shaped pool of dark water fills the foreground and extends back to the centre of the painting.  The massive, nearly vertical, stone sides of the quarry form cliffs which frame both the left and right sides of the painting Ð and the pool.  The smooth and slab-like stone face on the right side of the quarry is lit by the sun, and is painted in ochre, pink, peach, light grey and light blue colours.  At the top of this cliff grow bushes in green and red-brown; a line of small leafless trees rises behind.  Rooves and a pale-coloured chimney pot poke out from amongst the greenery.  

The cliff face on the left side is more broken and angular and lies in shade, shown by the use of darker colours; Birch has used a darker grey and blue and a purple shade to paint the rock here.  There are patches of green grass or low scrub growing on its sides.  Perched on the top of this cliff is a building with two chimneys; the sunlight catches its grey, slate roof.  The gable end wall of this building faces the viewer; growing in front of the wall is a gnarled and leafless tree Ð possibly an apple tree.  

In the centre of the canvas, between the two sheer rock faces, is a low- level, stone-surfaced working area, curving around the top of the horse-shoe of water.  On the left of this area stands a small, single-storey stone building with a grey slate roof and a bright blue painted door.  In front of this building is a pyramid-shaped derrick or lifting gear, made from huge beams and taller than the stone building.  At the back of the level area is an open-fronted store, containing a mound of ochre-coloured material Ð possibly sand or gravel.  The flat roof of the store is supported by five upright wooden posts.  

The surface of the water in the quarry pool catches the reflection of the sky, and the surrounding cliffs and structures.  On the right side the water is smooth, showing the blue sky and white fluffy clouds above, and a shallow reflection of the brighter cliff face.  On the left side a large ripple swirls round into the centre of the canvas, disturbing the dense shadow cast on the water by the darker cliff face and breaking up the reflection of the dark, angular shape of the derrick or lifting gear.  The swirls reflect the pinky colours of the quarry walls and the creamy colours of the clouds, and add movement to the water.  Birch was well-known for his ability to capture the movement of water, whether in stream, river, lake or sea.  

From the mid-ground of the painting, stretching away into the distance runs a narrow, white, dirt road.  There is a Cornish hedge topped with yellow gorse running along the right side of the road.  Suggestions of figures can be seen in a horse and cart travelling away from the viewer along the road.  On the right of the road lie agricultural fields and a cluster of pale-coloured farm buildings.  Some of the fields are laid to green pasture; others are bare brown ploughed soil or contain lines of growing crops.  To the left of the road is open moorland and bog, painted roughly in greens and browns.  In the far distance there are more fields and moorland as well as small farm settlements.  

On the horizon near the top left of the painting there is a glint of sunlight reflecting from a sliver of silver sea.  Moving across the horizon towards the right there are the indistinct, smudgy shapes of buildings, of which St BuryanÕs Church tower can just be distinguished.  The sky Ð made up of layers of broken grey and cream cloud Ð extends in a narrow band across the width of the painting.  

END OF AUDIO DESCRIPTION