Passing Trams

A quiet street scene unfolds under a blanket of fog, with two trams moving in opposite directions along the roadway. The palette is dominated by soft grays and whites, broken only by small orange lights that glow through the haze. This atmosphere gives the whole composition a hushed, muffled quality, as if sound itself has been dampened by the mist. The work was painted in 1931 using oil on board, and it is held at the Art Gallery of South Australia. Clarice Beckett (1887–1935) was an Australian painter associated with Tonalism, a style built on subtle gradations of tone rather than sharp contrast. One detail worth lingering on is how the orange lights seem to hover independently in the gray air, giving the only real points of warmth in an otherwise cool and veiled street.