South Downs Way Belle Tout Lighthouse Beachy Head

Print description

View of the picturesque Belle Tout Lighthouse on Beachy Head and in the distance the Seven Sisters chalk cliffs and Seaford Head.

Print details

Panoramic format. Print size 124 x 30.5 cm approx. Signed print from a limited edition of 100. From original ink drawing to which I apply colour digitally. Printed on fine art paper using archival inks.

Artists of the South Downs Way

The South Downs Way is a long distance footpath and bridleway running along the South Downs in southern England. The trail runs for 160 km from Winchester in Hampshire to Eastbourne in East Sussex.

Many famous artists have been inspired by the special landscape of the South Downs National Park with its chalk hills, river valleys and sandy heaths.

Jane Austen wrote most of her novels including “Pride and Prejudice” in Chawton. Virginia Woolf’s sister and other friends including the artist Duncan Grant, of the Bloomsbury set, lived at Charleston. Ditchling attracted communities of artists and craftspeople, including Eric Gill the lettering designer and sculptor.

Petworth country house and Goodwood both have exceptional collections of paintings and sculpture. William Blake, Joseph Turner and Constable among many others.

The Towner at Eastbourne has a collection of prints and watercolours by Ravilious, Eric Slater and Arthur Ridgen. Pallant House Gallery in Chichester has paintings by 20th century artists such as Ivan Hitchens who painted around Midhurst.

Artists in the periphery: Donal Maxwell, Stella Langdale

Whilst working on this collection I discovered two artists that today are not remembered much from the beginning of the 20th century. These are Donald Maxell and Stella Langdale. Donald illustrated a book titled ‘Sea and Sussex’ . It is full of wonderful lithographic work that depicts, as the name gives away, Sussex and the sea. Stella Langdale was also an artist from the same period, she studied art in Brighton. She illustrated a book called ‘Unknown Brighton’ with beautiful aquatints of Brighton and the sea.

Drawing Belle Tout Lighthouse. Netting a map of the Sussex Coast through connecting landmarks in the landscape

Belle Tout Lighthouse appears in five of my prints of this new collection. But it is not the first time I have portrayed this landmark in one of my pieces. Remarkably,  my panorama  ‘Hove Brighton Promenade’ is a view of Brighton and Hove from the end of the Western Lawns. And from this viewpoint, on a clear day, if you look east you can see right at the end Beachy Head, Which is the highest point along the coast, and on top of it, just outlined is Belle Tout Lighthouse. The creation of this view somehow closes the circle and ties up together.

A poem:  ‘The Run of the Downs’ by Rudyard Kipling

Poetry of the landscape, of the South Downs geography.

The Weald is good, the Downs are best-
I’ll give you the run of ’em, East to West.
Beachy Head and Winddoor Hill,
They were once and they are still.
Firle Mount Caburn and Mount Harry
Go back as far as sums ‘ll carry.
Ditchling Beacon and Chanctonbury Ring
They have looked on many a thing,
And what those two have missed between ’em
I reckon Truleigh Hill has seen ’em.
Highden, Bignor and Duncton Down
Knew Old England before the Crown.
Linch Down, Treyford and Sunwood
Knew Old England before the Flood;
And when you end on the Hampshire side-
Butser’s old as Time and Tide.
The Downs are sheep, the Weald is corn,
You be glad you are Sussex born!