On the skirts of the forest

John Crome's On the Skirts of the Forest (late 18th century–pre 1821) represents the mature development of his characteristic approach to English woodland landscape. The 'skirts' or edges of a forest were a favored motif in the tradition Crome helped establish — the threshold between open land and deep woodland, where light and shadow interplay most dynamically. Crome's forest edges owe an acknowledged debt to Hobbema's famous avenue paintings, translated into an English idiom and emotional register. The Norwich School's forest paintings constituted an important contribution to the British picturesque tradition and influenced landscape painters throughout the nineteenth century.

Crome builds the forest edge through layered applications of dark umber, olive, and golden-green, with individual tree trunks asserting themselves against a lighter sky glimpsed through gaps in the canopy. Brushwork varies between the smooth handling of sky and the more textured, worked surfaces of bark and foliage.