Pissarro

[Nicholas]

Does anybody know if Pissarro's painting of the old station on Lordship Lane is painted from the north or from the south and if that Grey object on the hill on the left of the painting is the Crystal Palace?

[Steve Grindlay]

This is the painting:

The artist was standing on the Cox's Walk footbridge, looking north. The hill in the distance, on the right, is now Horniman Gardens. On the left, between the tree and the double-gabled red brick building, part of Wood Vale winds into the distance. I'm fairly sure that the double-gabled building, on Lordship Lane between Wood Vale and Underhill Road, is the only building in this picture that still survives.

I think the "grey object" you refer to is actually one the the old field boundary oaks that still survive along Wood Vale.

[Nicholas]

Thanks mate

Do you know where it hangs?

[Steve Grindlay]

It's at the Courtauld Gallery:
http://www.courtauld.ac.uk/gallery/about/index.shtml

The other major Pissarro painting of Sydenham is in the National Gallery:
http://tinyurl.com/37dxpj