Audio description:
In The Fields by Fred Hall
Penlee House Gallery & Museum

In The Fields by Fred Hall depicts an agricultural scene and was painted in 1886.  It is an oil on canvas measuring 80 cm tall and 38 cm wide, or 30 inches tall and 15 inches wide, and is presented in portrait view with a gilt frame.  The foreground of the painting is dominated by a single standing female figure; she appears young, maybe in her 20s.  Our viewing angle is low so we look up at her.  She is holding a wooden rake and is turning slightly to face her right.  Behind her the canvas is divided horizontally into thirds. 

The top third shows the line of the horizon and, above it, the bright evening sky just after sunset.  The horizon is broken up by a few bare winter trees.  It crosses the picture at the figureÕs waist height.  Her head and torso are darkly silhouetted against the sky and clouds.  Behind the figure, in the middle third of the painting, there are shadowy fields with low heaps of grass, weeds or gorse burning.  There are glowing embers and smoke drifting up from the heaps.

At her feet, in the bottom third of the painting, there is a brown dirt path with a small ditch at its side.  The reflection of the evening sun glints in the ditch water by her right foot.

The womanÕs clothes are typical of many shown in works by the Newlyn School artists.  They are painted in soft browns and greens, apart from her long apron which is a startling white.  Her hair is brown, with a fringe and pinned up.  She wears a scarf around her shoulders.  She has a piece of brown sacking or ÒtowserÓ tucked into the waistband of her skirt which covers part of her apron.  Her apron shows the brush strokes of the square brush technique used by some Newlyn artists. (The flat of a square brush is used to lay the paint on the canvas in a jigsaw pattern of brush strokes.)  She has black stockings and one black shoe is shown beneath her ankle length skirt.

Her arms are hanging relaxed and extended slightly in front of her.  She holds the rake across her body at thigh height, as if she has been raking up material for the bonfires and is now quietly resting while they burn.  Her face is shown in profile looking to your left.  Her gaze is unfocused.  Her cheeks and the tip of her nose are flushed.

The same female figure is also part of the composition of Fred HallÕs painting Home from the Fields which was also painted in 1886.

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