Le Réveil Oil Artwork

Out on the open moor at first light, two males have their tails fanned and are circling each other while a female watches from the heather, waiting to see how it ends. Found in Le Perche in Normandy, this large signed oil is painted in soft browns and greens, the far edge of the field lost in morning mist. The scene is a lek, the display ground where the birds return to the same patch of ground year after year, the males posturing at dawn while the hens look on and choose, a ritual that has been going on far longer than anyone has been painting it. Sylvie hangs it big and low on a wall of its own, close enough to catch the white flash of the tail feathers from across the room.