Summer

Hornel has symbolised summer in the figure of a girl chasing a butterfly. Landscape and figures are seen as a flat, decorative design or pattern in two dimensions, not as a traditional scene receding into depth. Shapes and colours seem abstract and arbitrary as in a tapestry or a stained glass window - although they convey the idea of summer very effectively. The blouse of the running girl has Japanese decorative patterns and the curve of her body has the beauty of linear form common in Japanese art. There is a similarity with the French Post-Impressionists but no real evidence that Hornel knew their work. Summer caused uproar when it was purchased because of Hornel’s unusual painting style. His technique is so extreme it almost hides the butterfly the girls are chasing. One newspaper headline read ‘Art and Insanity at the Walker Art Gallery’. Although this is one of the most important paintings of the Glasgow School, the Gallery’s Chairman could only persuade the City Council in 1892 to buy it by the threat of resignation if they did not.