Photo credit: Lady Lever Art Gallery
All four seasons have their own visual qualities and symbolic meanings, which have appealed to artists through the centuries. Winter with its dark nights, bare trees and snow, is also a time for bonfires and New Year festivals. Spring is the time for optimism, rebirth and flowers; summer for heat and holidays, but also for the hard work of the wheat harvest. Autumn is associated with fruitfulness, the grape harvest and indulgence.
The importance of the endless cycle of the seasons is often represented in art, for example idealised figures may be depicted with a symbol of their season: perhaps a brazier, a bunch of flowers, a sheaf of wheat or a bunch of grapes.
