Berthelsen is an impressionist painter who is famous for his winter cityscapes of New York. He emigrated from Denmark as a child and lived in America for the rest of his life. His colour palette is very soft with hues of light greys and purples with bright pops of city colours. His forms are mainly quite flat with little tone.

He also rejected realism and focused his paintings on feeling and not accuracy: “It is always a pleasure to see a picture that is not merely technical, but contains the same interest and feeling of an artist for his subject.”

New York was a heavily developing city in the 1920’s with modernisation, transitioning from the coal powered era of the 19^th century to a richer place full of new cultures like Berthelsen’s. It was a perfect place for artists to document change and modernity in their cityscapes.

He was inspired by French impressionist paintings that were displayed in New York, the first of which was the Galerie Durand-Ruel show in 1886.

 

https://rehs.com/Johann_Berthelsen_Bio.html

Our project looks at how people can be lost in either a physical or emotional sense. We wanted to explore this feeling by placing a lone person in different landscapes and question what a landscape could be: someone’s room, a cityscape, nature. There are many reasons that a person can feel lost like, a break up, a loved one dying, demotivation in life etc. Feeling lost is associated with loneliness: In 2016 to 2017, there were 5% of adults in England who reported feeling lonely “often” or “always”. Younger adults aged 16 to 24 years reported feeling lonely more often than those in older age groups. It is interesting that people can feel lost and lonely even when surrounded by many other people. Through, photography, film,poetry and painting we hope to display this feeling through landscapes and cityscapes.

https://psychcentral.com/blog/when-you-feel-lost/

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/wellbeing/articles/lonelinesswhatcharacteristicsandcircumstancesareassociatedwithfeelinglonely/2018-04-10