A fine oil on canvas depicting a farmer feeding sheep at first light by John Rabone Harvey. The painting has a great feel of French Impressionism which is typical for the artist. The work is an exercise in depicting light within the romantic genre of portraying the nobility of rural life. The painting is in excellent condition having been professionally cleaned. Interestingly the work reuses a canvas that the artist had started painting a landscape on, which can be seen on the reverse. The work is signed to the lower right somewhat indistinctly but legible and there is also a signature on the reverse. John Rabone Harvey (1862-1933) was a well-known pastoral and portrait artist who studied at the Slade School. He lived in Birmingham and exhibited 68 times there, as well as at Liverpool and the Royal Academy. He also exhibited at the New English Art Club, a centre for French influence and impressionism founded in 1886 by a group of young artists modelled on the French Salon des Refuses. ...