Ingleby Gallery in Edinburgh is a showing Wings of a Butterfly – a group show that takes as its starting-point the final diary entry by the French artist Pierre Bonnard, written shortly before his death in 1947, in which he stated, ‘I should like to present myself to the young painters of the year 2000 with the wings of a butterfly.’
The invited artists have considered Bonnard’s work in different ways, thinking about it in relation to their own, conjuring a collective mood through this common thread. They include Andrew Cranston, who says, ‘I love (Bonnard’s) doubt, which is visible on the canvas… This keeps an openness and some work for the viewer to do’ – words which echo Bonnard’s own declaration that, ‘The painting will not exist if the viewer does not do half the work.’
