Vladimir Kalensky A Green Dress for Cities and Towns! 1957 lithograph (poster) Yale University Art Gallery |
Fernand Léger Worker with Rope ca. 1950-51 drawing (study for painting, The Constructors) Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh |
Kenneth Miller Adams Reapers (Harvest) 1946 oil on canvas Denver Art Museum |
Alma Duncan Army Women in Warehouse 1943 oil on board National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa |
Kazimir Malevich The Knife-Grinder, or, Principle of Glittering 1912-13 oil on canvas Yale University Art Gallery |
Paula Modersohn-Becker Old Farmer 1904 oil on cardboard Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich |
Aimé-Jules Dalou Le Botteleur (binding sheaves) ca. 1894 bronze statuette National Gallery of Art, Washington DC |
Henri Gervex Worker lifting a Block ca. 1885 drawing (study for ceiling painting) Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh |
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec The Marble Polisher ca. 1882-87 oil on canvas Princeton University Art Museum |
William Carrick Boatmen, River Volga 1875 albumen print Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh |
Giovanni Boldini Washerwomen 1874 oil on canvas (sketch) Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts |
Léon Bonvin The Kitchen 1862 watercolor and gouache Walters Art Museum, Baltimore |
Alexandre Jean-Baptiste Hesse Study of a Shepherd ca. 1860 drawing Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh |
Benjamin West Harvesting at Windsor ca. 1795 oil on canvas Denver Art Museum |
Jean-Antoine Watteau Two Young Cobblers ca. 1715-16 drawing Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam |
Titian Man carrying a Rudder over his Shoulder ca. 1555-56 drawing Getty Museum, Los Angeles |
The Churchyard Wall
Stone against stone, they are building back
Round the steepled bulk, a wall
That enclosed from the neighbouring road
The silent community of graves. James Bridle,
Jonathan Silk and Adam Bliss, you are well housed
Dead, however you lived – such headstones
Lettered and scrolled, and such a wall
To repel the wind. The channel, first,
Dug to contain a base in solid earth
And filled with the weightier fragments. The propped yews
Will scarcely outlast it; for, breached,
It may be rebuilt. The graves weather
And the stone skulls, more ruinous
Than art had made them, fade by their broken scrolls.
It protects the dead. The living regard it
Once it is falling, and for the rest
Accept it. Again, the ivy
Round the steepled bulk, a wall
That enclosed from the neighbouring road
The silent community of graves. James Bridle,
Jonathan Silk and Adam Bliss, you are well housed
Dead, however you lived – such headstones
Lettered and scrolled, and such a wall
To repel the wind. The channel, first,
Dug to contain a base in solid earth
And filled with the weightier fragments. The propped yews
Will scarcely outlast it; for, breached,
It may be rebuilt. The graves weather
And the stone skulls, more ruinous
Than art had made them, fade by their broken scrolls.
It protects the dead. The living regard it
Once it is falling, and for the rest
Accept it. Again, the ivy
Will clasp it down, save for the buried base
And that, where the frost has cracked,
Must be trimmed, reset, and across its course
The barrier raised. Now they no longer
Prepare: they build, judged by the dead.
The shales must fit, the skins of the wall-face
And that, where the frost has cracked,
Must be trimmed, reset, and across its course
The barrier raised. Now they no longer
Prepare: they build, judged by the dead.
The shales must fit, the skins of the wall-face
Flush, but the rising stones
Sloped to the centre, balanced upon an incline.
Sloped to the centre, balanced upon an incline.
They work at ease, the shade drawn in
To the uncoped wall which casts it, unmindful
To the uncoped wall which casts it, unmindful
For the moment, that they will be outlasted
By what they create, that their labour
Must be undone. East and west
They cope it edgewise; to the south
Where the talkers sit, taking its sun
By what they create, that their labour
Must be undone. East and west
They cope it edgewise; to the south
Where the talkers sit, taking its sun
When the sun has left it, they have lain
The flat slabs that had fallen inwards
Mined by the ivy. They leave completed
Their intent and useful labours to be ignored,
The flat slabs that had fallen inwards
Mined by the ivy. They leave completed
Their intent and useful labours to be ignored,
To pass into common life, a particle
Of the unacknowledged sustenance of the eye,
Less serviceable than a house, but in a world of houses
A merciful structure. The wall awaits decay.
– Charles Tomlinson (1960)
Of the unacknowledged sustenance of the eye,
Less serviceable than a house, but in a world of houses
A merciful structure. The wall awaits decay.
– Charles Tomlinson (1960)