Doorway to the refectory, Kirkham Priory, Yorkshire

John Sell Cotman made this watercolour at Kirkham Priory during the second of three summers he spent in Yorkshire. A sunlit patch of masonry and a luminous sky pierce the golden haze enveloping the medieval ruins. The Norman arch is observed from an oblique angle to exaggerate its monumentality; a shadow cast on the doorway hints at a greater structure looming nearby. Devoid of human presence, this evocative portrait of a ruin becomes a study of light and shadow on stone.