Looking Out : Welsh painting, social class and international context

'Over the last twenty five years, almost single-handedly,Peter Lord has transformed a collection of poorlyunderstood evidence of art created in Wales, and lazytheoretical assumptions about it, into a discipline in itsown right, equipped with analytical frameworks andsupported by an accumulating body of knowledge.'-Andrew Green, Wales Arts Review (on The Tradition)The six sequential essays in this collection provide anarrative of a century and a half of Welsh painting,written with an emphasis on issues of social classand national identity.Through his earlier writing,Peter Lord has contributed to the establishment of anhistorical tradition of Welsh painting, but because itdoes not feature in the wider story of western art historyas presently told, the work revealed continues to beperceived as marginal, existing in isolation from ideasand movements in other countries.These essays breaknew ground by discussing the concerns of Welsh paintersnot only in domestic terms but also in the context of theways in which artists in other parts of Europe and in theUnited States reacted to the common underlying causesof those concerns.The author challenges the idea that thework of Welsh painters is relevant only to the evolutionof their own communities and, through confident anddetailed analysis, validates their pictures also in terms ofthe arts of other western cultures.