The swimming pool, with its rich symbolism and rippling surface, has found itself the subject of many a modern artwork, with many contemporary painters returning to themes of swimming and submergence again and again. In a feature for Elephant earlier this year, Victoria Woodcock dove into the hidden depths of pool paintings, from those of David Hockney to the likes of Jonathan Wateridge (seen here). “It’s telling that Wateridge’s 2019 exhibition was entitled This Side of Paradise, after F Scott Fitzgerald’s 1920 debut novel,” notes Woodcock of the artist’s somewhat eerie scenes. “The paintings summon up hedonistic Californian pool parties, but the atmosphere is sinister and unsettling.” Click here to read on.
