Room 1: Landscape

There, far below is the knobbly backbone of England, the Pennine range. At first the whole length of it, from the Peak to Cross fell is visible. Then the Derbyshire Hills and the Cumberland fells disappear, for you are descending, somewhere about the middle of the range, where the high moorland thrusts itself between the woollen mills of Yorkshire and the cotton mills of Lancashire. Great winds blow over miles and miles of ling and bog and black rock, and the curlews still go crying in that empty air as they did before the Romans came…
J.B.Priestly The Good Companions (1929)

In his opening paragraph to The Good Companions, fellow Yorkshireman J.B. Priestley introduces us to his Yorkshire from high above the Pennines, much as Richard chose implausible view points from which to interrogate his subjects below. He captured the county’s drab hues and its flat light, and celebrated its magnificent rock formations and wild moorland. In these works, Richard went far beyond more literal, topographical translations by using his prodigious memory to select what were for him the most visually charged elements of their composition: his combination of unusual viewpoints and perspectives, of heightened light and shade, producing paintings of great drama and power.