Featured Watercolour painting

Hi all, thoughts on this painting,please. I especially like mountains and the shadows.Is this what you call negative painting? The label looks 50’s or so to me (couldn’t find much on The Art Picture House,Salisbury) The signature looks like maybe R… Hope A.R.E.T to me? What would A.R.E.T mean? The frame size is 53 x47cm. Thanks for any comments and keep well

 

Suppose it could be,I will search. Thank you

 

I read Ronald Hope. I like it, it looks Australian.

I wonder if it could be this Ronald Hope:
https://www.mutualart.com/Artwork/Forest-Path/74AC1CC16A4AE8D3

 

Ronald Hope is Australian.

https://www.aasd.com.au/artist/15251-ronald-hope/

 

Not Table Mountain?

Debora

 

With ghost gum trees? And isn't the top of Table Mountain flat?

 

The Art Picture House was founded in Salisbury, Rhodesia in 1926 so that's your earliest date. A.G. Cook described as "Picture Framer and Mounter, Glass and Fine Art Dealer.

Debora

 

He also made keys, sharpened surgical instruments and repaired sewing machines which leads one to believe that the "fine" art he dealt should be interpreted in the broadest sense.

Debora

 

Thansk Debora,I did come across that but then I also saw this. Which made me think there’s another The Art Picture House in Salisbury UK?
https://camdenlockbooks.com/product...677-publication-date-1673-condition-very-good

 

Curious, isn't it? But A.G. Cook appears to have been associated with the Rhodesian entity. The landscape doesn't look English. And, as @Any Jewelry, has pointed out, it doesn't look much like Table Mountain either.

Debora

 

Sure it reads A.R.C.T. and not A.R.C.?

Debora

 

Great. Many thanks AJ. At first I was not a 100% sure because the ‘R’ and the ‘H’ looked different to me and all his other works seemed to be pastel. But now I see he signed in different ways including apparently Ron Hope (and that R matches) So I thinking you must be correct

 

Could be. Not sure at all. What does that then mean? Thanks

 

Ha ha,I agree. Busy guy!

 

Odd that they even listed the Po Box no. the same.

 

Didn’t consider that at all and I still don’t think it is. But just for interest sake from this view and with a little imagination and some liberty it could almost be . But yes then the foreground doesn’t make sense
https://www.flickr.com/photos/8270787@N07/864892886

 

Must be somewhere there about! Many thanks Debora

 

Maybe Rosa Somerville Hope [1902-72] a British artist that visited South Africa in 1935,and stayed ,might be a possibility, time line with framing Co start date 1926 would be a fit,and in one of her etchings of a Windmill her signature is followed by 3 letters starting with an A. and possibly R.C. after that.