Swan Chestnut

Swan Chestnut is a work by London artist Hugh Hamshaw Thomas. The original artwork is based on a photograph taken on the edge of lake landscaped by Humphry Repton (1752-1818). The artwork presents itself as if it were a piece of wallpaper or fabric in the Toile de Jouy style – seemingly of a similar period to the work undertaken by Repton. By presenting the image duplicitously as a photograph in a style belonging to the decorative arts, Hamshaw Thomas fuses themes of romantic melancholia, the bucolic and Arcadian with his interest in layering of histories, narratives and remembrance.