Here you see a view of a gate pier and lime tree avenue as captured by the artist Paul Nash in a painting called Pillar and Moon. It was painted in the 1930’s and is now held by the Tate Gallery.
The six gate piers and the boundary wall have recently been restored by Oxfordshire County Council who own the site.
The two main gateposts flanking the entrance formerly held iron gates. The support hinges for these can still be seen. They are also decorated with rusticated masonry and are slightly larger than the four lesser piers. All were originally capped with stone ball finials. One of these lay in the farmyard for some years and has now been replaced.
Paul Nash said that this picture was based around “the mystical association of two objects which inhabit different elements and have no apparent relation in life... The pale stone sphere on top of a ruined pillar faces its counterpart the moon, cold and pale and solid as stone.” Though not explicitly about mourning, the deep, unpopulated space and ghostly lighting gives the scene a melancholy air. Rather than depict a real landscape, Nash said that his intention had been “to call up memories and stir emotions in the spectator.”
