It’s a gate, but this is a rather lovely painting by John Crome (1768-1821) and the museum notes that it’s potentially the “quintessential Crome painting”, with a peaceful feel to the whole arrangement. It dates from around 1810 and it was donated by Russell James Colman (1861–1946) as part of his legacy to the museum. The artwork is known as either ‘The Gate’ or the ‘Norgate Crome’, but I prefer the former as I like simplistic.
As someone who likes walking, there’s a certain charm in paintings of gates, muddy paths, fences, stiles and clumps of trees. There’s a permanence to this, as although the scene could be anywhere, there’s a good chance that it looks pretty similar today. Well, unless Crome has selected a gate that’s now under a housing estate, but I think a more romantic frame of mind is probably useful here.
Artworks of nothing much at all can sometimes be really rather intriguing, the figure in the painting is almost irrelevant and the viewer (perhaps not the most appropriate word there) has no idea what is beyond that gate. But, travel is about never knowing what is around the next corner, so that fits in well.
One real advantage about the traditional elements of the collection at Norwich Castle Museum is that they’ve got an excellent depth of information on their website about the exhibits. All of the new exhibits in the Castle Keep are devoid of reference numbers, which makes matters much more complex in trying to find the item in the online collection. This is an x-ray of the artwork and although it might not tell me very much, I really quite like looking here at the nails at the edge of the painting. I should probably get out more….