Train in the Desert, 1981

Donald Hamilton Fraser RA (1929 - 2009)

RA Collection: Art

In 1979 Fraser was invited to be one of ten British artists who were to travel through Israel with the object of producing an exhibition of work showing their different experiences of the country. The exhibition, Israel Observed - Ten British Painters, was shown at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem in 1980. Train in the Desert was inspired by this visit and is based on his observations in the Negev Dessert which is located in the south of Israel.

In common with much of Fraser's work this painting represents a particular site, but it is not highly descriptive and presents an intensified image of the location. He renders the scene almost as an abstract painting with a bold, vibrant use of colour. Fraser feels that art does not need to expand on a subject, but to distil it. He has stated that 'there has always been a sort of painting that resists the written word. It is drawn from the eye and the heart and is about the experience of the present moment. I suppose my own work is of that kind.' [Horizons: an exhibition of paintings by Donald Hamilton Fraser, exh. cat., A.T. Kearney, 1996]