Charcoal Drawing from Series “Dorothy Wordsworth”

Location

Country: UK
City: London
Place: Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, 100 Parliament Street

In this charcoal drawing comprised of two framed pieces, Harrison foregrounds the poet and diarist Dorothy Wordsworth (1771–1855), sister to the poet William Wordsworth. Harrison situates a verdant image of undergrowth above a smudged handwritten extract from Dorothy’s diary Grasmere Journal (1800–03), which William often borrowed from without acknowledgement. The cited text veers between household tasks and lyrical observations about nature, suggesting the labour that underpins romantic visions of rural England.

Places

England, Grasmere, Lake District, Cumbria

Subjects

text-based work

Materials & Techniques

paper (as artists material), charcoal, charcoal drawing

Artist

Margaret Harrison (1940 - )

Title

Charcoal Drawing from Series “Dorothy Wordsworth”

Date

1980

Medium

Charcoal on paper; drawing with accompanying text piece

Acquisition

Purchased from the artist, November 2010

Provenance

the artist

GAC number

18356