Measom (George) The Official Illustrated Guide to the London and North-Western Railway, first edition, wood-engraved frontispiece and illustrations,numerous advertisements, original pictorial wrappers, a little rubbed and soiled, corners slightly frayed but a good copy, preserved in modern half dark maroon morocco, spine faded, 1856; The Official Illustrated Guide to the Brighton and South Coast Railways and their Branches, wood-engraved frontispiece and illustrations, contemporary half morocco, rubbed, [c.1851-2]; and a map of the London Brighton and South Coast Railway of c.1884, 8vo (3)⁂ The first is the one shilling (?now preferable) printed wrapper version, for 2s. it came in cloth with gilt edges. A rare survivor, by 1864 it had grown to 723 pages, and it stayed in print for over fifty years. There were various editions of the second work dated 1852, '53 & '54. This undated edition does not have the folding plate or map seen in others.
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Moreau (P.) Description Raisonnée et Vues Pittoresques du Chemin de Fer de Liverpool a Manchester, edited by Auguste Notré, first edition, half-title, folding engraved map, 2 folding engraved plates of rails and locomotives and 9 engraved views by Ollivier on india paper and mounted, light foxing, bookplate of J.J.Haut, handsome contemporary dark maroon boards with elaborate foliate border in gilt and "A Son Altesse Le Prince Royal" to upper cover, spine gilt, uncut, a little rubbed, spine faded, 4to, Paris, 1831. ⁂ A lovely copy of this attractive book, which demonstrates how quickly British advances in railway science were appreciated on the continent. This copy with a bold inscription to the popular Prince Royal, the young and dashing Ferdinand-Philippe d'Orléans.
Nichol (Andrew) Five Views of the Dublin and Kingstown Railway, first edition, 5 superb hand-coloured aquatints by J.Harris after Nichol, 8pp. publisher's catalogue tipped inside rear wrapper, sewn in original printed wrappers, a little spotted and soiled, slight fraying to spine, preserved in modern half dark maroon morocco portfolio, spine slightly faded, [Not in Abbey], 4to, Dublin, William Frederick Wakeman, [plates dated and water-marked 1834].⁂ A superb copy of this great rarity, with only a handful of copies recorded at auction, the most recent being in 1980. The first railway in Ireland had difficulties to overcome. One opponent, Mr. O'Hanlon, told a Railway Committee of the House of Commons in 1833 that it "would be a monstrous thing that the solid advantages of commerce, manufactures, and all the blessings resulting therefrom, should he sacrificed to a few nursery maids descending from the town of Kingstown to the sea at Dunleary, to perform the pleasures of ablution." Storms also caused a delay as a vital bridge was destroyed. It was finally opened in December 1834 with two engines, the Vauxhall and the Hibernia, which were able to reach speeds of over thirty miles an hour.
Parry (Edward) Railway Companion from Chester to Shrewsbury, first edition, large folding engraved map (torn), 10pp. advertisements, Chester, 1849; Parry's Railway Companion from Chester to Holyhead, first edition, folding map, 26pp. advertisements, 1848 § Cornish (J. & S.) Cornish's Guide and Companion to the Grand Junction and the Liverpool and Manchester Railways, third edition, folding hand-coloured map, folding table, 40pp. advertisements, 1838 § Sidney (Samuel) Rides on Railways leading to the Lake & Mountain Districts of Cumberland, North Wales..., first edition, folding map, 24 plates, 6pp. advertisements, [1851], all original cloth, a little rubbed and faded, 8vo et infra (4)
Peepshow.- Faber (G.W., publisher) Deutschland's erste Eisenbahn zwischen Nurnberg und Fuerth, hand-coloured etched scene of railway with title in German, French & English and train & carriages running along top, mounted on board with three holes for viewing through 5 hand-coloured etched sectional plates and background mounted on rear board, joined and folding concertina style into viridian glazed boards, with original card slip-case with engraved label to upper cover (slightly rubbed), preserved in modern half dark maroon morocco slip-case with pull-off top, spine faded, oblong 8vo, Nuremberg, G.W.Faber, [1835].⁂ Charming and scarce peepshow of the first German railway, in excellent condition. The title/cover illustration shows the maiden journey of the Eagle, a Stephenson train, pulling a tender, 4 coaches for passengers and a couple of goods waggons, on the six kilometre journey from Nuremberg to Fürth, amidst much wonder and merriment from the many onlookers. A horse-drawn carriage to the foreground neatly illustrates the march of time.
Photographs.- An extraordinary collection of c.500 photographs of steam engines, many large format images as produced by many manufacturers throughout the second half of the nineteenth century and first half of the twentieth, depicting mostly nineteenth century engines, many albumen prints, most c.300 c.220 x 370mm. (or larger) or c.200 c.220 x 32mm. (or slightly smaller), loose in 4 old cloth portfolios with ties, arranged by railway line rather than manufacturer (LMS, LNER, Southern), rubbed, folio, [c.1859-1950].⁂ The original collector appears to have been a senior officer of Beyer and Peacock, and many of the images bear their design studio stamp on the reverse, sometimes dated many years after the photograph was taken, but nevertheless these are vintage prints clearly held in stock by the firm. The noted Manchester photographer James Mudd was the house photographer, many of the enclosed are from his studio. The collection has many quirky and interesting engines and some of the Beyer-Garratt type, and many that were sent overseas to all corners of the globe, especially to Australia.
Bourne (John C.) The History and Description of the Great Western Railway, including its Geology..., second issue, additional pictorial lithographed title, lithographed dedication leaf and list of plates with vignette, 47 fine lithographed views and architectural details on 33 sheets, most tinted, paper guards, 2 hand-coloured maps and a hand-coloured geological cross-section at end, with lithographed vignettes of Paddington Station at end of Preface and Bathampton church at end of Appendix A, both on india paper and mounted, some foxing, modern half dark maroon morocco, t.e.g., fading to spine and head of upper cover, [Abbey, Life 399; Ottley 5930], folio, Bogue, 1846. ⁂ Second printing of the first edition of 1843. Although the work is commonly known as Bourne's the informative text was actually written by George Thomas Clark, an engineer and respected geologist, who worked with Brunel on two sections of the line and was responsible for the Basildon and Moulsford bridges. Probably the grandest work from the early days of railways, containing many iconic images familiar because of their use in later works.
Photographs.- Lord-Castle (Arthur) Photograph Album of Palestine during and after the First World War, c.100 postcard size photographs mounted on 25 leaves, a few captioned in ink on the photograph, with original manuscript map of Palestine 1916-22 drawn in ink and colours on graph paper and loosely inserted, a few photographs loose, contemporary cloth-backed boards, rubbed, small 4to, [1916-22].⁂ The collection was formed at the time by an enthusiast or professional, at one time stationed at Kantara. There are many scenes of damaged rail stock, bridges, accidents. etc. and two possibly suggesting that the collector was one of the military district engineers. After the Armistice there are several pictures of Palestine and Jerusalem in particular.
Pim (James) The Atmospheric Railway. A Letter to the Right Hon. the Earl of Ripon..., 4 folding lithographed plates, modern cloth, privately printed, 1841 § Mallet (Robert) Three reports upon Improved Methods of Constructing and Working Atmospheric Railways, first edition, 10 engraved plates, 8 double-page, foxed, contemporary half roan, rubbed, [1845] § Jouffroy (A., Marquis de) Chemins de Fer- Système Jouffroy. Quelsques Mots...sur le Chemin de Fer Atmosphérique, first edition, modern half dark maroon morocco, g.e, spine faded, with original pictorial green wrappers bound in, Paris, 1844, 8vo & 4to (3)⁂ Clegg and Samuda's patented atmospheric railway ran on a section of line at Wormwood Scrubs, using a fixed airtight tube and a piston attached to the car. It made many journeys and successfully ran up an incline of 1/100, returning on the track by gravity. The system was cheaper to build and had many advantages over locomotive power, being used in the Dalkey to Kingstown line where it achieved in one run a speed of about 60mph. The Irish line ran from 1843 for over 10 years. It was the first commercial line of its type.Robert Mallet was an Irish civil engineer, not to be confused with Charles François Mallet who had been sent by the French Government to report on the Dublin Dalkey atmospheric railway and who also issued a report. Robert Mallet came into dispute with the Samudas, builders of the Dalkey line, over patent issues, which are referred to here. He later built the Fastnet Rock lighthouse.The Marquis Achille de Jouffroy proposed a rail system with a central cog arrangement, it was reviewed favourably in the Railway journal of 1844.
Provis (William Alexander) An Historical and Descriptive Account of the Suspension Bridge Constructed over the Menai Strait...from Designs by and under the Direction of Thomas Telford, 2 vol. including Atlas, first edition, signed and inscribed "Presented to the Royal Society of Edinburgh by Thomas Telford Esq. FR.SS.L & Ed." at head of title of text and to front free endpaper of Atlas, text with engraved folding plate of facsimile signatures (spotted), Atlas with 15 engraved plates and plans (4 double-page and folding) and 3 fine aquatint views, some foxing, mostly marginal, contemporary half russia, worn, joints split, spines defective, covers of Atlas detached, folio & large folio, 1828.⁂ The Menai Bridge was built by Thomas Telford in 1826, connecting mainland Wales with the isle of Anglesey.
Bradshaw (George) Bradshaw's Railway Time Tables..., No.3, folding map with routes supplied in red & yellow (slightly frayed at edges), 8 double-page maps/plans, original purple cloth, 11th Mo. 18th [i.e. 18th November] 1839; Bradshaw's Railway Companion..., folding glazed map with route in red, 8 double-page maps/plans, some partly hand-coloured, folding cross-section, original greyish-purple cloth, Manchester, 7th Mo. 1st [1st July] 1840; Bradshaw's Railway Companion, 2 folding maps with routes in red and/or yellow, one glazed, 8 double-page maps/plans, some partly hand-coloured, folding cross-section, original green cloth, Manchester, 1840; Bradshaw's Railway Companion, 2 folding and 13 double-page maps/plans, some partly hand-coloured, a little stained, original greyish-purple cloth, 1844, all with green and gold glazed label to upper cover, the last a different format, the first worn and chipped, all rubbed, a few small stains, preserved together in modern half dark maroon morocco drop-front box with lid and catch, spine gilt, 24mo⁂ A good group of early Bradshaws. The first is the third issue, after those on 19th and 24th October which covered the northern and southern railways respectively. This is the first to contain both north and south.
Redard (Dr Paul, Médecin-Major, d.1917) Transport par Chemins de Fer des Blessés et Malades militaires, Deuxieme Rapport, manuscript, 69ff. including index at end, written in black ink on rectos only, illustrated with 26 technical drawings or plates printed in blue and 10 photographs mounted on card, 9 of the train and its medical facilities, c.200 x 150mm or vice versa, foxing and staining to one or two plates, contemporary half red morocco, rubbed, 4to, 1901.⁂ Médecin-Major Redard was in charge of French military railway hospitals. This is his second report. He issued his first 1882, and here brings the matter up to date, examining each country in Europe's plans and improvements up until 1901. The two British trains, built for service in South Africa, of which Redard is highly complimentary, are very well illustrated with 9 photographs.
Rennie (George).- House of Commons. Minutes of Evidence taken before the Lords Committees..."An Act for making and maintaining a Railway or Tramroad from the Town of Liverpool to the Town of Manchester, with certain Branches therefrom, all in the County of Lancaster", George Rennie's copy with his inscription at head of title, another later pencil inscription, occasional spotting, bookplate of J.J.Haut, modern half calf, roan label, folio, 1826.⁂ This Bill achieved Royal Assent on the 5th May 1826, thanks in part to replanning of the route by the freshly appointed engineers, the brothers George and John Rennie and their surveyor Charles Vignoles. An earlier attempt with George Stephenson as the surveyor was thrown out because of inaccuracies. George's testimony here amounts to some 30 pages of the Minutes. As is well known the Liverpool Manchester Railway was the first intercity railway service in the world. George Rennie was a principal in the undertaking, making the provenance of this copy especially significant.
Roscoe (Thomas) The London and Birmingham Railway, first edition, engraved additional vignette title and plates, folding engraved map at end dated 1838, illustrations, tissue guards, a good clean copy, contemporary half calf, rubbed, Tilt, [1838] § Hand-book (A) for Travellers along the London and Birmingham Railway, folding hand-coloured map, wood-engraved plates, advertisement leaf at end, [1839] § Midland Counties' Railway Companion (The), first edition, engraved decorative half-title folding map and 4 plates including one of Derby Station not called for, illustrations, Nottingham & Leicester, 1840, the last two modern half dark maroon morocco, g.e., spines a little faded, 8vo et infra (3)⁂ Rugby, Leicester, Nottingham and Derby became connected by the Midlands Counties' Railway, which opened for public use in the summer of 1839. Its independence was short lived, as crippled by the competitive rates of its rivals in the transportation of coal, it was more or less forced into a partnership by 1844.
Simms (Frederick W.) Public Works of Great Britain, Division I only (of 4), first edition, engraved vignette title, aquatint illustration in text, wood-engraved vignettes and 72 plates (numbered 1-82), some folding or double-page, occasional spotting, George Turnbull's copy with gilt-stamped morocco "Telford Premium" prize label to front pastedown, later half maroon morocco, small circular gilt vignette from original cloth binding mounted on upper cover, g.e., a little rubbed, slight fading to spine and head of upper cover, [Abbey, Life 410], folio, 1838.⁂ Monumental work on civil engineering and one of the most important 19th century illustrated books on the subject. Division I is concerned with railways and takes up half the work, the later ones being on canals, bridges and docks; roads; the Port of London.George Turnbull (1809-89) was the "First Railway Engineer of India". A Scot, he had a long career throughout the U.K. working as Telford's clerk, then for Cubitt and others and later in his own capacity. He left for India in 1850 and built the railway from Calcutta to Benares and Allahabad. His achievements in India led to the offer of a knighthood, which he modestly declined.
Smeaton (John) A Narrative of the Building and Description of the Construction of the Edystone Lighthouse with Stone, first edition, engraved title-vignette by Birrell after Dixon and 23 engraved plates and charts by Faden, Roberts, Record and Rooker, one folding, title with marginal soiling, light staining to plate 17 and spotting to one or two at end, a few pencil marginalia, bookplate of Institution of Naval Architects, later half calf over original marbled boards, uncut, rubbed, joints and spine ends worn, spine torn at head, folio, for the Author, by G.Nicol, 1791.⁂ Smeaton's own account of his great lighthouse, completed in 1759. His tower was the third on the treacherous Eddystone reef, 14 miles off the the Plymouth coast. The two earlier timber structures, by Winstanley and Rudyard, had both been destroyed. Building with masonry, Smeaton devised an ingenious method of dovetailing and interlocking the blocks of stone to ensure maximum strength, and his example was followed for later rock towers. The work contains a detailed, season-by-season account of the construction, revealing the appalling difficulties encountered on the site. It includes descriptions of the stonework, of experiments to ascertain the best composition of hydraulic cements, of machinery and lifting tackle, and accounts of Winstanley and Rudyard's structures. In the appendix, Smeaton describes the construction of the Spurn Point lighthouse on the Humber bank, which was built to his design between 1771 and 1776.
Smeaton (John) Experimental Enquiry concerning the Natural Powers of Wind and Water to turn Mills and other Machines depending on a Circular Motion, second edition, 2 folding letterpress tables, 5 folding engraved plates, 1796 bound with Venturi (J.B.) Experimental Enquiries concerning the Principle of the Lateral Communication of Motion in Fluids, first edition in English, 2 folding engraved plates, 1799, together 2 works in 1 vol., ink signature to head of title, light spotting, bookplate of Institution of Naval Architects, contemporary half calf, rubbed, rebacked preserving old spine § Smeaton (John) Reports..., 3 vol., first edition, engraved portrait, plates and plans, foxed, contemporary half calf, rubbed, lacking most corner-pieces, rebacked, 1812, 8vo & 4to (4)⁂ The first work is a collection of various reports on hydrodynamic subjects, here, as is sometimes the case, bound with Venturi's work on broadly the same subject. Venturi made an important discovery in this field on the variation of water pressure after constricted flows which became known as "The Venturi Effect". The last work shows the extraordinary range of Smeaton's achievements inventions and projects, collected from his papers which Joseph Banks acquired after Smeaton's death. Banks part-funded this impressive printed memorial to the "Father of Civil Engineering".
Tait (A.F.) & Edwin Butterworth. Views on the Manchester & Leeds Railway, first edition, additional tinted lithographed vignette title and 19 fine tinted lithographed plates by A.F.Tait, tissue guards, a very clean copy, modern half dark maroon morocco, t.e.g., spine very slightly faded, [Abbey, Life 411], folio, London and Manchester, 1845.⁂ A lovely copy of a work often found in poor shape. The legal framework completed in 1836, the first section of the railway, from Manchester to Littleborough, was completed in 1839, and the line in toto by 1841. George Stephenson was the overseeing engineer. After company mergers etc. in 1847 the Manchester & Leeds became the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway.
Talabot (Paulin) Panorama della Strada-Ferrata delli Appennini Bologna, Pistoja, Firenze, tinted lithographed panorama, c.230 x 3200mm. and additional view mounted on inside cover, with lithographed title, 11pp. text (browned) and French translation all loosely inserted, folding into original gilt-decorated cloth folder, lacking ties, preserved in modern half dark maroon morocco slip-case with pull-off top, Bologna, Giulio Wenk, 1864 § Desenat (J.) Lou Camin de Ferri de Marsio a Avignoun...a M.Paulin Talabot, first edition, text in Occitan, stitched in original printed pale blue wrappers with train vignette, uncut & unopened, preserved in modern half dark maroon morocco portfolio, Marseilles, 1843 § Blasi (Benedetto) Della Strada Ferrrata Pia-Cassia da Citta della Pieve a Civitavecchia..., first edition, folding engraved frontispiece, 3 maps, 2 folding, modern half dark maroon morocco, Rome, 1846, spines a little faded; and an Italian trade catalogue, oblong 8vo & 8vo (4)⁂ The first is an unusual birds-eye-view of the journey, the second is an unusual poetical account of the proposed railway line between Marseilles and Avignon in local dialect, the third is an account by Blasi, one of the early proponents of Italian railways, but this line, because of papal opposition, was not completed until the 1860s.
Telford (Thomas) Report...relative to the proposed Railway from Glasgow to Berwick-upon-Tweed; with Mr Jessop's Opinion thereon..., first edition, title soiled and stained with small hole not affecting text, trimmed, modern calf-backed marbled boards, Edinburgh, A.Neill & Co., 1810 § Edinburgh & Glasgow Railway. Rules and Regulations..., second issue with 'New Rule' dated October 1842 bound in, original canvas wallet with flap with blank leaves at end (some torn out) and ruled slate mounted on rear pastedown (broken), lacking pencil, preserved in modern half dark maroon morocco slip-case with pull-off top, Edinburgh, 1842 § Guide to the Glasgow & Ayrshire Railway, folding map, lithographed plates, 2 folding, original pictorial cloth, gilt, rubbed, Ayr, 1841; and 2 others, a copy of Hill's Views of the Opening of the Glasgow and Garnkirk Railway lacking the 4 lithographed plates, and a bound volume of 24 reports of meetings of shareholders/directors of the Glasgow, Paisley, Kilmarnock, & Ayr Railway 1836-47 belonging to James McCall of Daldowie, Chairman of the Board of Directors, 4to & 8vo (5)⁂ Optimism abounds in the committee's deliberations in the first item, but the scheme was stillborn. Nevertheless this is an interesting report summing up not only the costs, (£2926 per mile), but the potential benefits (£55,000 p/a), returning a nett benefit of 12%. In summing up Telford suggests that the project "is one of the most important that has ever come under my consideration". A rare work, with only 5 copies recorded worldwide, two in America, the remaining three in Scotland.The Edinburgh & Glasgow Railway opened at a cost of over a million pounds on the 21st February 1842. It was an enormous success with three times the estimated passenger traffic. By 1850 the line required 58 engines and 216 carriages. A rare survivor from the earliest days of intercity railway travel in Scotland.
Telford (Thomas) Life of Thomas Telford, Civil Engineer, edited by John Rickman, 2 vol. including Atlas, first edition, text lacking half-title, with engraved plate (lightly foxed), Atlas with engraved portrait and 82 maps & plates numbered 1-83 (no plate 28 as called for), several folding and/or double-page, some with routes supplied in red, some foxing, particularly to portrait and title, contemporary half russia, Atlas with gilt-stamped label to upper cover, spines ruled in gilt, a little rubbed and faded, Atlas with upper joint split, 4to & folio, 1838.⁂ Account of the great engineer's life and work written by himself, describing canals, roads, aqueducts and bridges including the great suspension bridges over the Menai Strait and at Conway.
Tredgold (Thomas) Traité des Machines a Vapeur, translated by F.-N.Mellet, 2 vol. including Atlas, second, expanded, edition, text with half-title, Atlas with 25 engraved plates, some double-page, final plate torn and repaired, foxed, contemporary green morocco-backed boards, gilt, rubbed, spine of Atlas torn, upper cover detached, Paris, 1837 § Seguin (Marc, aîné) De L'Influence des Chemins de Fer et de l'Art de les Tracer et de les Construire, first edition, signed and inscribed by the author to the Minister of Public Works on half-title, 6 folding plates, light spotting, Paris, 1839 § Nothomb (Baron J.B.) Travaux Publics en Belgique 1830-1839. Chemins de Fer et Routes Ordinaires, second edition, 37 folding tables, Brussels, 1840, the last two modern half dark maroon morocco, t.e.g., spines slightly faded; and another, 8vo (5)⁂ Marc Seguin was one of the foremost engineers of the day; his boiler had been used on Stephenson's Rocket engine, and he was one of the two principals behind France's first railway between St Etienne and Lyon. The third item concerns Belgium which, after the U.K., was the first to adopt rail transport in any significant way. It was the first country to have a national rail network, and beyond the economic benefits their development was seen as a key element in forging the identity of the new state founded in 1830.
Tuck (Henry) The Railway Shareholder's Manual, first edition, occasional spotting, 1845; ninth edition, 1848, original pictorial cloth, gilt, a little rubbed, spines faded; and Tuck's Railway Directory for 1847 and 1850,12mo (4)⁂ "The astonishing number of projected railways which have recently been brought before the public.... will render the year 1845 unparalleled in the history of railway enterprise". (Preface). There were seven editions of the Shareholder's Manual in 1845, one in 1846, and the ninth in 1848, the latter being much expanded, from 117pp. to 491pp.
Walker (George) The Costume of Yorkshire..., first edition, titles and text in English and French, hand-coloured aquatint frontispiece and 40 plates by R. and D.Havell after George Walker, occasional spotting, slightly trimmed, modern calf, gilt, spine gilt with red roan label, a few minor scratches, nick to head of spine, [Abbey Life 432; Colas 3044; Tooley 498], folio, 1814 [plates watermarked 1811 & 1815].⁂ Several of the images from this book have become icons as depictions of the working classes before the start of the industrial age, but the best known image is of the fledgling steam locomotive designed by John Blenkinsop hauling coal at the Middleton colliery. By 1815 Blenkinsop had built four engines of this type for the colliery. It was a rack engine, its drive wheel engaging a toothed rail for added traction; it could haul 90 tons of coal.
Two portfolios of watercolours from the archive of architect, artist and poet Gavin Pomeroy. Including architectural drawings, architectural, architectural watercolours, landscape and abstract watercolours, linocuts, prints etc. together with poems, architectural magazines, sketchbooks etc. and two Russell Flint prints.William Gavin Ingram Pomeroy 4 April 1929Born in Newlyn his family moved to Mousehole when his grandfather died. The Pomeroy’s owned many properties in Mousehole and were market gardeners. They owned the meadows flanking Raginnis Hill in Mousehole. His mother Ann nee White’s family were the White’s from Newlyn who built many properties in Newlyn including Eden Terrace.A great all-rounder academically, artistically, musically and also a good sportsman. Gavin played in local teams becoming captain of the junior teams in the 1940’s – football and cricket.His mother was very musically gifted and was the accompanist for Mousehole Male Voice Choir for over 30 years. Ann worked for a local solicitors and also taught the piano and organ. Gavin inherited his mother’s musical talent – he sang his first solo at the age of 14, eventually joined Mousehole Male Voice Choir – still a member (maybe still the vice-chair). And up until his recent ill health was in demand both in Cornwall and around Devon as a soloist. Gavin played the piano and violin.In his primary school, he was awarded a board school scholarship and went to what became Humphry Davy Grammar School for boys.In 1947 he started as an articled architectural student with Geoffrey Bazeley & Associated, Chartered Architects, 15/16 Alverton Street, Penzance.During his time as a student with Bazeley’s, Gavin took a correspondence course all about building, with the International Correspondence Schools Ltd. This involved doing drawings, lettering and answering a comprehensive range of questions covering all trades.In 1951 Gavin travelled to Plymouth to study architecture at the School of Art Department of Architecture in Palace Court. He boarded with a local lady and in later years married his landlady’s daughter Joy Richings, whose family were from Berneray in the Outer Hebrides (his nephew on his wife’s side and family still live there).Around 1955 Gavin was called up for National Service and deployed to Chatham Barracks, Kent where he was taken on as a draughtsman in the Sappers. He designed the gates for the barracks that were built there.He married in 1955 and he joined the choir at Plymouth Methodist Central Hall.Bazeley’s opened a branch in St Austell and later in Plymouth, Gavin headed up both.He became a part-time lecturer for Plymouth School of Architecture in the evenings and in 1964 was offered a full-time position. Gavin’s wife encouraged him to take this change of direction in his architectural career. Whilst working at the Polytechnic, Gavin successfully completed a 2 year Master’s Degree in architecture at Bath University. By the time he retired in 1999, Gavin was the senior lecturer in architecture at what was then Plymouth Polytechnic and is now Plymouth University.Throughout his life, Gavin never stopped sketching, painting (particularly watercolours and pastels that he either kept or gave to family and friends) and writing poetry.The Mousehole Archive has Pomeroy family history and Gavin’s niece has some of his paintings and some recent family history.Sadly, Gavin now has dementia but has clearly lead a very artistic and interesting life.
A large exterior lantern, with painted copper hood and tapered glass sides inscribed 'First And Last Inn', formerly positioned outside the famous Sennen pub. Height 122cm overall.Condition report: In need of restoration and re-wiring. Missing glass door. However, a really impressive lantern.
A late 19th/early 20th century silk panel, embroidered with the name 'Francis', floral garlands and beadwork bows, inset into a later metal bound oak tray, with glass liner. 19.5 cm x 28.5cm.Condition report: The silk is much fractured along the weft, this can clearly seen by zooming closely into the detail of the first image which is high resolution. However as the panel is held sandwiched tightly under glass the intergrity of the panel is fine and does not move.
Of American Interest. An oval pearlware plaque, circa 1800, moulded and overpainted with the figures of George Washington, first President of the United States, and his wife Martha Washington. Height 20.5cm, width 26.5cm.Condition report: Condition generally good. Small 5mm chip to rim on reverse. No obvious signs of damge or repairs.
William Roberts R.A. (British, 1895-1980)Women Playing with Cats signed 'William Roberts.' (lower left); titled 'Women Playing with Cats' (on the backboard)pencil, ink, watercolour and gouache29 x 20.3 cm. (11 3/8 x 8 in.)Executed circa 1919Footnotes:ProvenanceMichael A. Tachmindji, 1956With Hamet Gallery, London, 16 February 1971, where purchased by the mother of the present ownerPrivate Collection, U.K.ExhibitedLondon, Tate Gallery, Wyndham Lewis and Vorticism, organised by Arts Council of Great Britain, 5 July-19 August 1956, cat.no.72 (as Drawing 1913); this exhibition travelled to, Manchester, City Art Gallery, 1-22 September, Glasgow, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, 29 September-20 October, Bristol, City Art Gallery, 27 October-17 November and Leeds, City Art Gallery, 25 November-15 DecemberLondon, Hamet Gallery, William Roberts: A Retrospective Exhibition, 16 February-13 March 1971, cat.no.9Printed here in colour for the first time ever, over one hundred years after its execution by William Roberts, probably circa 1919, the remarkable and dynamic Women Playing with Cats is testament to the artist's affiliation with Vorticism and his close acquaintance with both Percy Wyndham Lewis and David Bomberg.Accompanied by prestigious exhibition history at Tate's 1956 show, Wyndham Lewis and Vorticism, their gallery label attached on the backboard dates the work to 1913; reiterated again on the Hamet Gallery label. Stylistically, however, this mesmerising and sophisticated work on paper is more in keeping with Roberts' work produced directly following World War I, which was still firmly grounded in Vorticism. A date of circa 1919 has been proposed by David Cleall who compiled the artist's Catalogue Raisonné, available online only at: www.englishcubist.co.uk. Certainly, when one considers his two canvases The Diners and The Dancers of 1919 (Tate collection and Glasgow Museums: Art Gallery & Museum, Kelvingrove, respectively), designed as part of a three-panel work to be situated in the bohemian Hôtel de la Tour Eiffel on Percy Street in Fitzrovia, the revised dating seems entirely accurate.During the spring of 1914 Lewis visited Roberts at home in Cumberland Market, on the edge of Regent's Park, where a small artistic community flourished. Roberts had only left The Slade in the summer of 1913, and following a trip to France, taking in Paris, had already begun to experiment with incorporating Cubist elements into his work; The Return of Ulysses (Castle Museum and Art Gallery, Nottingham) and The Toe Dancer (Victoria & Albert Museum, London) are two of the finest examples. The story of Lewis leaving Cumberland Market with two of Roberts' Cubist paintings, The Dancers and Religion, now both sadly presumed destroyed or lost, is well known. He returned with these to his Great Ormond Street studio where the recently established Rebel Art Centre was founded. Andrew Gibbon Williams comments, 'Lewis had come to view the visual arts as merely one element in a larger cultural war that might overturn all the tired nostrums, prejudices and conventions that persisted into the new century from Victorian times. For him, art possessed the potential to transform society itself; the entirety of Western culture needed to be wrenched out of the doldrums of bourgeois passivity and forced to correspond with the new violent age of the machine.' (Andrew Gibbon Williams, William Roberts, An English Cubist, Lund Humphries, Aldershot, p.23). With the partnership of the American writer and poet Ezra Pound, Lewis announced Vorticism (named by Pound) with the publication in July 1914 of a small magazine entitled BLAST: The Review of the Great English Vortex. Dancers and Religion by Roberts were both illustrated alongside images by Sir Jacob Epstein and Edward Wadsworth, among others.With Women Playing with Cats Roberts draws on the abstract pictorial language laid down by Lewis in key works from the period 1913-1915, such as Composition (Tate collection) and Plan of War (lost). The emphasis on highly stylised geometric forms, overlapping angular shapes used to distort reality and the dramatic use of black and white superimposed over rusty-brown all point to Roberts' engagement with Vorticism's main visual protagonist, prior to him being called up for active service in April 1916. Whereas the faces, in particular, reference the new machine age with their simplicity and clean lines, and in the central standing figure's head we are specifically reminded of Sir Jacob Epstein's seminal Torso in Metal from 'The Rock Drill', 1913-15 (Tate collection).During Roberts' time at The Slade his friendship with David Bomberg, a fellow student, developed. Five years older, Bomberg played a significant role in guiding Roberts' aesthetic. As Gibbon Williams notes, 'It was Bomberg who was largely responsible for converting Roberts to the philosophy of modern art and Roberts himself paid tribute to his friend on this account in a fine example of his mastery of understatement: 'an additional stimulant to my interest in abstract art was the example of David Bomberg, a friend and fellow student''(op. cit. p.16). Both artists visited Paris during the summer of 1913 at a time when Bomberg began to produce some of the most radical abstract work of his entire career, inspired by the European avant-garde. The celebrated paintings of Ju-Jitsu (Tate collection) and In the Hold (Tate collection) acted as a prologue to his early masterpiece The Mud Bath of 1914 (Tate collection). The complexity of these compositions with the interplay of limbs and their optical energy were the most audacious and forward-thinking paintings produced by any British artist during this period of enormous change. Roberts did not escape their massive impact, and when one considers Women Playing with Cats and its fragmented, dazzling use of black ink and bare paper to describe the subjects, Bomberg's daring pre-war imagery is among the first to spring to mind.Another of Robert's contemporaries from The Slade, Edward Wadsworth, also played a fundamental role in Vorticism. But much like Roberts, the outbreak of war seriously disrupted his creative momentum. By 1915 Wadsworth joined the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve and a year later was serving as an Intelligence Officer on Lemnos, Greece. By 1917 the Admiralty had embraced the idea put forward by the artist Norman Wilkinson of camouflaging its ships with boldly painted, dazzling designs which not only created an optical distortion of the shape of the vessel, but also confused the German enemy of its speed and angle, thus making it a far more difficult target for submarines. Later based in Liverpool docks, Wadsworth oversaw the transposition of the designs onto the ships themselves and then produced a small series of works which depicted them; a striking woodcut, Liverpool Shipping of 1918 (see fig.1) was used as a basis for his 1919 Dazzle-Ships in Dry Dock at Liverpool (National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa) commissioned by the Canadian War Memorials Fund and arguably Wadsworth's greatest picture. Roberts, too, was commissioned by the Canadians, and The First German Gas Attack at Ypres also of 1918 (National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa) was, like Wadsworth's, noticeably more naturalistic and descriptive than their abstracted pre-war creations, owing to the commission's strict orders which included having nothing 'Cubistic' about them.Women Playing with Cats continues this effective and appealing mix of realism with the principles of Vorticism, making for an accessible yet arresting image. When the eyes become almost hypnotised and a little confused by the bravura design of the five black and white figures and two cats, which are thru... This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
David Bomberg (British, 1890-1957)The Old City and Cathedral, Ronda signed and dated 'Bomberg 35' (lower left)oil on canvas64 x 76.1 cm. (25 x 30 in.)Footnotes:ProvenanceAsa LingardSale; Jackson-Stops, Cirencester, 1-2 May 1957, lot 149, where purchased byMrs E. C. Bowes, thence by family descentPrivate Collection, U.K.ExhibitedLondon, Tate Gallery, David Bomberg 1890-1957: Paintings And Drawings, 2 March-9 April 1967, cat.no.61 (as Ronda); this exhibition travelled to Hull, Ferens Art Gallery, 22 April-13 May, Manchester, City Art Gallery, 20 May-10 June, Bristol, City Art Gallery, 17 June-8 July, Nottingham, Castle Museum and Art Gallery, 15 July-5 August 1967 Looking at this prime example of David Bomberg's Spanish paintings is like accepting an irresistible invitation. Here, in 1935, he encouraged viewers to explore the most ancient part of a city which had captivated him immediately when he discovered it a year earlier. Once Bomberg settled in Ronda with his family, 'he painted day after day, without much of a pause' according to his partner Lilian. Enthralled at first by what he described as 'the gorge -- a stupendous rent' splitting the city at its very centre, Bomberg then committed himself to exploring Ronda's awesome and inexhaustible identity.Taking a vantage which leads our eyes towards the heart of the old quarter, he reveals the full extent of his fascination. At the bottom of this canvas, two female figures can be detected standing next to a doorway. The older woman stretches out an arm and, with a maternal gesture, clasps the young one beside her. Either waiting for someone to arrive or simply savouring the view, they are the only people detectable in Bomberg's painting. As its title suggests, The Old City and Cathedral, Ronda focuses on buildings rather than their inhabitants.In the same year, Bomberg executed a powerful charcoal drawing called Rooftops, Ronda from almost the same viewpoint, disclosing just how fascinated he felt when gazing down at the tight-knit structure of the architecture congregated around the historic cathedral in the distance. This large drawing, included in a major celebratory exhibition of Bomberg's career held at the Daniel Katz Gallery in 2007, testifies to his eloquent draughtsmanship. And the painting, doubtless created soon after he completed the charcoal study, proves that he was eager to capture the old city with brush in hand.Although Bomberg remains faithful to Ronda's identity throughout this canvas, there is no hint of topographical dullness anywhere. On the contrary: the marks enlivening his painting have a life of their own. He revels in the dramatic contrast between one side of his composition and the other. On the left, the foreground buildings are relatively dark. Viewed close-to, the freedom of Bomberg's brushstrokes makes us realise how far he is prepared here to push himself towards abstraction. He handles the pigment with surprising forcefulness, giving the thick paint an exemplary sense of dynamism and excitement. Whereas on the right, the tall foreground house asserts its substance even while appearing far paler, as if preparing to dissolve in the dramatic brightness of the light.Bomberg, a Londoner who had grown up in the grime of a smoky and polluted East End, was enchanted by the sun's potency in Spain. It transformed his vision of the world, and the potency of light is evident throughout The Old City and Cathedral, Ronda. Wherever we look, the luminosity emanating from the sky plays a crucial role in defining the buildings below. The pale house on the far right is alive with deft and subtle diagonal shadows cast by the roof and the window-sills below. Then suddenly, further along the sloping street leading deep into the city, sunshine hits at least two more houses. Doors and windows are painted with extraordinary liberty as our eyes pursue them down the street. Bomberg clearly relishes treating them as a sequence of energetic, vertical paint-strokes. They take on a near-abstract vivacity and independence. So does the curving surface of the street itself, evoked with generously loaded swipes of his brush. We share the artist's relish as he claims the freedom to summarise the essence of Ronda in such an emancipated way.Alongside this emphasis on freewheeling vividness, though, Bomberg also conveys his awareness of the city's vulnerability. As he lets us penetrate the tightly-knit clusters of buildings in the distance, we become aware of their poignant fragility, too. Ronda's allure had seduced him into staying there, but he remained acutely conscious of the ravine plunging downwards at the city's heart. In the most distant part of this painting, the land suddenly rears up on the left and proclaims the presence in Ronda of what Bomberg himself described as 'the amphitheatre of mountains by which it is surrounded.' This city had been erected in an intensely dramatic location, and the sheer strength of its surroundings is asserted in this area of his painting. The mountain looms over the city, forever reminding all its inhabitants of the geological violence which must once have created the immense fissure running through Ronda.That is why the near-silhouetted bulk of the cathedral itself makes such an assertive contribution to Bomberg's painting. He gives the spire a thrusting prominence by ensuring that the patch of sky directly behind it is very pale indeed. Later in his life, Bomberg was sufficiently impressed by the architecture of St. Paul's Cathedral in London to make several outstanding drawings of its near-miraculous ability to survive Nazi bombs during the Blitz. He subsequently drew Notre Dame's spires and towers in Paris as well as the side façade of Chartres Cathedral. So although Ronda's cathedral occupies a distant position in Bomberg's painting, he made sure that its impact is assertive. Undisturbed by the restlessness evident in the sky all around, this cathedral presides over Ronda's historic city with unequivocal strength and assurance. The linear elegance of the spire is equally impressive, asserting its poised presence in the air while the secular buildings below almost seem to be jostling with each other in a far more confined space.Looking at The Old City and Cathedral, Ronda today makes us realise how much stimulus and sustenance Bomberg gained by painting it. In 1935 he also became a father here, for the first and only time in his life. Lilian recalled that the birth made him 'very worried and frightened all the way through', especially at the alarming moment when 'the baby was born purple and black because she was tangled up with the umbilical cord.' But little Diana survived, and Bomberg then ecstatically declared she was 'the loveliest thing one could wish for.' Ronda occupied such a special place in his life that he returned there in 1954, executing many of his finest late paintings and drawings before a terminal illness prompted his reluctant, gruelling return to England three years later. Seen in this light, The Old City and Cathedral, Ronda can be viewed above all as a celebratory painting, executed with admirable verve by an artist who had fallen in love with Spain. We are grateful to Richard Cork for compiling this catalogue entry.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Helen Bradley (British, 1900-1979)Aunt Edith was Sixteen and Wept for Love signed 'HELEN BRADLEY' and with fly insignia (lower right)oil on board30.6 x 38 cm. (12 x 15 in.)Footnotes:ProvenanceThe Artist, thence by family descentThe Estate of Margaret BradleyFour Paintings from the Family of Helen Bradley (1900-1979)Born in 1900 as Nellie Layfield in Lees, a small industrial town on the northern fringe of Oldham, Helen Bradley would become one of the nation's most loved painters, but not until her late sixties.Helen (who changed her name from Nellie by deed poll) was born into a well-established family of local business owners. She attended art school in Oldham where she met fellow student Tom Bradley, who was considered the star pupil. Following a long engagement, the couple would marry in 1926 with two children to follow, Peter born in 1927 and Betty in 1931. Whilst both Helen and Tom painted throughout their lives, and it was accepted between them that if either had a chance of painting professionally Tom was the stronger candidate, neither pursued this career initially. Throughout the interwar years Tom worked in textile manufacturing for a Manchester based firm who specialised in hand printed fabrics (including several Omega patterns by Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant) whilst Helen kept the home. Following the Second World War, Tom's work led the family to relocate to Middlesex. This afforded Helen the opportunity to visit the National Gallery and British Museum regularly and to attend art school in Harrow. The family returned to the North West in 1952 when Tom took early retirement to allow him to focus on his painting which consisted of portrait and flower commissions. They initially settled in Cheshire before buying a cottage in Cartmel on the edge of the Lake District in 1964. Now in her 60s, Helen painted with a renewed vigour, traveling around the Lakes producing misty landscapes in watercolour, whilst Tom rented a second nearby cottage as a studio for his portrait work. Together the couple joined the local Saddleworth Art Society, through which Helen first met L.S. Lowry. She once expressed to Lowry that she had always struggled to paint figures and he suggested that she should 'paint someone you know well, go home and paint your mother'. This she did, and the resultant portrait proved to be an important turning point. Shortly after she began painting scenes from her own childhood that she would become so loved for, depicting a world full of incident viewed with innocence and rendered in exquisite detail.It was not until 1965, at the age of sixty-five that Bradley had her first solo exhibition. Staged by the Saddleworth Art Society to much local acclaim, it led to a request from Cork Street's Mercury Gallery for six of her works to be included in an exhibition of naïve art the next year. There followed a little over a decade of subsequent highly successful exhibitions in Britain, America and Japan, and the publication of many much-loved books and prints. Bradley enjoyed a broad public profile that few artists ever achieve; she was announced by the media as 'The Jolly Granny' and 'England's own Grandma Moses' (although she notes her personal inspirations as Avercamp and Turner). She was appointed an MBE in the 1978 Queen's Birthday Honours, but sadly died before her investiture.The following four works were given by the artist to her son Peter. They have remained in the family collection since then, with Uncle Tom's Funeral Procession taking pride of place above the dining table.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
William Roberts R.A. (British, 1895-1980)Munitions Factory pencil and watercolour 30.5 x 42.4 cm. (12 x 16 5/8 in.)Executed in 1940Footnotes:ProvenanceWith Hamet Gallery, London, 15 April 1970, where purchased byMr & Mrs J.R. Capstick-DaleWith Michael Parkin Fine Art, London, where purchased byLady DugdaleExhibitedLondon, Hamet Gallery, William Roberts: A Retrospective Exhibition, 16 February-13 March 1971, cat.no.54London, Michael Parkin Fine Art, William Roberts: An Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings, 17 November–4 December 1976, cat.no.51The outbreak of war in September 1939 gave William Roberts a much-needed opportunity. With the turmoil abroad came a great degree of personal upheaval resulting in having to move the family from London to Oxford. However, the conflict brought about new subject matter that favoured his figurative style, which had spent much of the 1930s in the shadow of Abstraction, epitomised by the Unit One movement and spearheaded by Paul Nash and his contemporaries. Roberts had seen some of the bloodiest action during The Great War, toiling in the trenches of Belgium and France with the artillery and carrying out the incredibly dangerous task of repairing communication lines between field batteries. Taken up as an Official War Artist, Roberts produced some outstanding work including the significant oil The First German Gas Attack at Ypres (1918, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa), a commission from the Canadian War Memorials Fund (CWMF). However, he is perhaps most admired for the smaller pen and ink drawings and watercolours worked up in the Cubist manner from his Flood Street studio in Chelsea once relieved from active military service. Upon writing to the War Office on the 12th September 1939 in the hope of securing commissions he did so with the benefit of experience, hoping to become one of the few artists to document both conflicts in Europe.Roberts was rewarded for his enthusiasm with an assignment to accompany the British Expeditionary Force to France where he would illustrate some of its senior figures. To his detriment the artist failed to appear on the continent, feeling instead that he could produce equally accomplished work in England. Clearly the War Artists' Advisory Committee did not share Roberts' sentiments and owing to his petulance cancelled his contract with almost immediate effect. This unfortunate turn of events scuppered his chances of becoming the fully-fledged war artist he deserved, and it took a grovelling letter to Kenneth Clark, the committee's chairman and owner of his 1929 picture Bath Night (Bolton Museum and Art Gallery), to be reconsidered for even periodic commissions.Three instructions from the War Artists' Advisory Committee were to follow with the first, Munitions Factory (1940, City of Salford Museums and Art Gallery, Manchester), capturing the fraught environment at the Woolwich Arsenal. The present work is a detailed preparatory version for that oil painting and is almost identical in composition. Numerous tradesmen including mechanics, welders and plate-cutters scramble to complete work on an anti-aircraft gun assembly line as the country rises to the challenge of competing with German military might. Their manner has the sense of quiet confidence about it as respective trades come together to fulfil the requirements of the nation at a time of emergency. It was a natural subject for Roberts of course who himself had worked in a Tufnell Park munitions factory during 1915 and manages to successfully incorporate his expertise into the composition whilst at the same time giving centre stage to the individual workers.The Control Room, Civil Defence Headquarters (City of Salford Museums and Art Gallery, Manchester) followed in 1942 and echoes Roberts' preoccupation with the everyday man and woman playing their part in the war effort. In stark contrast to the raw industry of Munitions Factory, this painting transports us into the secret world of intelligence gathering where suited men study a large colourful map of London, divided into sectors whilst telephone operators pass on incoming messages. The final work, A Station Scene in Wartime (1942/43) was executed in watercolour showing a busy platform with men, women and children waving goodbye to one another, evoking the personal strains and emotions placed on family life during wartime. An ironic victim of the conflict itself, this work was destroyed in enemy action shortly after completion.In June 2018 Bonhams offered William Roberts' Demolition Squad (circa 1941 and sold for £125,000) which, although not an official commission from the War Artists' Advisory Committee, also demonstrated the artist's interest in portraying daily life during the conflict. In this work, the finished oil for which is held in the collection of the Guildhall Art Gallery, City of London, the setting is a blitzed building, most likely Christopher Wren's Christ Church Greyfriars in Newgate Street, which was almost totally destroyed in the intense air raid of 29th December 1940.We are grateful to David Cleall and Bob Davenport for their assistance in cataloguing this lot.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
John Nash R.A. (British, 1893-1977)Llangennith Panorama signed 'JOHN NASH' (lower right)oil on canvas71.2 x 91.5 cm. (28 x 36 in.)Footnotes:ProvenanceWith Thomas Agnews & Sons, London, 22 April 1969, where purchased byPrivate Collection, U.K.Their sale; Duke's, Dorchester, 26 September 2019, where purchased by the present ownerPrivate Collection, U.K.Llangennith Panorama is a large work by John Nash and presents a sweeping view of the countryside and coast in this favoured part of the Gower Penninsula, South Wales. The artist was consistently drawn to locations of outstanding beauty and first visited the area in 1939 with his wife, who assisted him in finding suitable locations to paint. In the present work Nash depicts a pleasing and suitably complex arrangement of agricultural buildings in the immediate foreground, flanked by a tall, bare tree, which allows for a detailed study of the partitioned fields in the middle ground with their subtle variance of colour and shape. This leads into the protective dunes of Rhossili Bay, with the tidal island of Burry Holms just visible to the right, that give way to the vast expanse of sea that is shrouded in capably handled cloud cover and delicate light. The observation of a 'working countryside' and the natural landscape were important to Nash who juxtaposes them to great effect in Llangennith Panorama.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Dame Barbara Hepworth (British, 1903-1975)Maquette (Variation on a Theme) bronze with a brown and white patina43.8 cm. (17 1/4 in.) high (excluding the wooden base)Conceived in 1958, the present work is number 2 from the edition of 9Footnotes:ProvenanceWith Laing Gallery, TorontoMichael Tollemache, 1970With James Goodman Gallery, New York, 1971Private Collection, U.S.A.With James Goodman Gallery, New York, September 1999, where purchased byWith New Art Centre, Salisbury, February 2000, where purchased byRoss D. Siragusa Jr., from whom acquired by the present ownerPrivate Collection, U.K.ExhibitedOttawa, National Gallery of Canada, Recent British Sculpture, organised by the British Council, 13 April 1961, cat.no.4 (another cast); this exhibition travelled to Québec, Montreal Museum Of Fine Arts, May, Winnipeg, Art Gallery, June, Regina, Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery, July, Toronto, Art Gallery Of Ontario, August, London (Ontario), Regional Art And Historical Museum, September, Vancouver, Vancouver Art Gallery, 1-30 April 1962, Aukland, City Art Gallery, 5-29 July, Wellington, Dominion Gallery, 21 August-9 September, Dunedin, Otago Museum, 9-28 October, Christchurch, Canterbury Museum, 20 November-9 December, Adelaide, Art Gallery Of South Australia, January 1963, Canberra, Australian National Museum, 13 January-23 February, Perth, Art Gallery Of Western Australia, 24 January, Adelaide, Adelaide Festival, 4 April-5 May, Hobart, Tasmanian Museum And Art Gallery, May, Launceston, Queen Victoria Art Gallery, 30 May, Melbourne, National Gallery Of Victoria, July, Sydney, Art Gallery Of New South Wales, August, Brisbane, Queensland Art Gallery, September, Newcastle, Newcastle Region Art Gallery, October and Canberra, National Gallery, 1 January-31 March 1964London, Whitechapel Art Gallery, Barbara Hepworth: An Exhibition of Sculpture from 1952-1962, May-June 1962, cat.no.37 (another cast)Florence, British Arts Council, Barbara Hepworth: Mostra Fotografica con Disegni e Originali, 8-16 October 1966, cat.no.4 (another cast)New York, Memorial Art Gallery, Twentieth Century Art: The Charles Rand Penny Collection, November 1983-August 1984, cat.no.47 (another cast); this exhibition travelled to New York, State University Art Gallery, October-December 1984, California, San Jose Museum of Art, September-November 1985, Wheeling, Stifel Fine Arts Centre, January-March 1986, Baton Rouge, Louisiana Arts and Science Centre, April-May, Tampa, Tampa Museum of Art, June-July, Little Rock, Arkansas Art Centre, August-September, Oklahoma, Oklahoma Art Centre, November-December, Jackson, Mississippi Museum of Art, January-February 1987, Spokane, Cheney Cowles Memorial Museum, June-July, Oshkosh, Paine Art Centre, September-November, Texas, Beaumont Art Museum, January-February 1988 and Shreveport, Meadows Museum, March-May 1988Liverpool, Tate, Barbara Hepworth: A Retrospective, 14 September–4 December 1994, cat.no.57 (another cast); this exhibition travelled to New Haven, Yale Centre for British Art, 4 February-9 April 1995 and Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario, 19 May-7 August 1995LiteratureJ.P. Hodin, Barbara Hepworth, London, Lund Humphries, 1961, cat.no.247 (ill.b&w) (another cast)Matthew Gale and Chris Stephens, Barbara Hepworth, Works in the Tate Collection and the Barbara Hepworth Museum St Ives, Tate Publishing, London, 2001, p.182Owing to her desire to have direct contact with materials, Barbara Hepworth came to bronze casting somewhat later in her career with the first appearing in 1956. Alongside wood and stone, bronze was a medium which the artist would continue to explore until the end of her life, producing some of her finest and most memorable work from it. Maquette (Variation on a Theme) was conceived in 1958 and belongs to the early stages of development in one of the artist's important commissions. At Lillian Somerville of the British Council's recommendation, Hepworth was put in touch with the architects Trehearne & Norman Preston who were designing a sixteen-story office block on High Holborn for The Wohl Group. This was to become the now demolished State House with the sculpture presiding over the entrance titled Meridian. As Somerville explained, 'for once these architects do not want symbolism or a subject or a theme but an abstract sculpture', which must have been a particular draw for the artist (M. Gale and C. Stephens, Barbara Hepworth, London, 1999, p.182). Indeed, in an interview at the time, Hepworth described how 'with this commission I felt no hesitation whatsoever. By next morning I saw the sculpture in my mind quite clearly. I made my first maquette, and from this, began the armature for the working model. The architect must create a valid space for sculpture so that it becomes organically part of our spiritual perception as well as our three-dimensional life. To do less is to destroy sculpture and admit to an impoverished architecture' (P. Curtis and A.G. Wilkinson, Barbara Hepworth, A Retrospective, Liverpool, Tate Gallery, 1994, pp.154-155). Following an initial plaster model, Hepworth first created Maquette for State House (Meridian) (BH 245), which was later cast in an edition of 9. The present work, Maquette (Variation on a Theme), followed and was also to be cast in an edition of 9 with this being number 2. The work displays a complex tangle of ribbons which bind together and form triangular loops with the ultimate intention of contrasting with the building's linear architecture. The sculpture is clearly derived from the landscape with its strong sense of form and texture which was always at the forefront of the artist's mind. Maquette (Variation on a Theme) conveys a vivid sense of the artist's experience with the childhood memories of hills in Yorkshire and the weathered coast of Cornwall both translated into sculptural form. When explaining her choice of title for Meridian to the architect Harold Mortimer, Hepworth commented that 'it refers either to an imaginary arc of longitude (quintessentially, the Greenwich Meridian) or to the highest point in the arc of the sun' (M. Gale and C. Stephens, loc. cit.). Meridian was erected in London in 1960, the year after Hepworth claimed the Grand Prix at the Sao Paulo Art Biennial and was unveiled in front of a wall of Cornish granite by Sir Philip Hendy, Director of the National Gallery. Upon its demolition in 1990, the sculpture was sold to the Donald M. Kendall Sculpture Gardens in Purchase, New York, which is the headquarters of PepsiCo. The success of Meridian was an important development for Hepworth and led to future commissions including Winged Figure for the John Lewis building on Oxford Street. We are grateful to Sophie Bowness for her assistance in cataloguing this lot.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Henry Moore O.M., C.H. (British, 1898-1986)Reclining Figure stamped with a 'C. VALSUANI CIRE PERDUE' foundry mark (on top of the base)bronze with a black patina15.2 cm. (6 in.) longConceived in 1945 and cast in an edition of 7Footnotes:ProvenanceSale; Kornfeld & Klipstein, Bern, 10 May 1963, lot 794With Samlaren Gallery, Stockholm, from whom acquired byTheodor Ahrenberg, from whom acquired byLa Boetie Inc., New York, 1967, from whom acquired byPrivate CollectionTheir sale; Sotheby's, New York, 4 November 1993, lot 370, where acquired by the present ownerPrivate Collection, SpainExhibitedStockholm, Samlaren Gallery, Henry Moore: Sculptures and Drawings, 1952Stockholm, Akademien, Henry Moore, 1952, cat.no.121LiteratureDavid Sylvester, Henry Moore: Volume 1, Complete Sculpture 1921-1948, The Henry Moore Foundation in association with Lund Humphries, Much Hadham & London, 1988, p.15, cat.no.246During his long and distinguished career, the 'reclining figure' along with the 'mother and child' theme were the two subjects that obsessed Henry Moore more than any other. Recent information from the Henry Moore Foundation indicates there are 270 examples of the reclining figure and 140 of the mother and child, perhaps confirming the former as the most significant; certainly the most fundamental. By 1968, Moore admitted this was the case: 'From the very beginning the reclining figure has been my main theme. The first one I made was around 1924, and probably more than half of my sculptures since then have been reclining figures' (John Hedgecoe, Henry Moore, London, Thomas Nelson, 1968, p.151). The origins of that first reclining figure (male and now destroyed) can be traced back to the Toltec-Mayan idol Chacmool. Impressed by a life-sized limestone carving from the eleventh or twelfth century found in Chichen Itza in Mexico, Moore came across a plaster cast of Chacmool on a visit to the Trocadero Museum in Paris in 1925. The curious reclining posture of the figure on its back, with knees drawn up and head twisted to the right fascinated Moore and it became 'undoubtedly the one sculpture which most influenced my early work' (Henry Moore Writings and Conversations, ed. Alan Wilkinson, London, Lund Humphries, 2002, p.98).The present work was conceived at the end of WWII in 1945 as a preparatory study for the 30 in. Hornton stone carving Reclining Figure (1947-49, LH 273, now in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art). It was originally modelled in terracotta (whereabouts unknown) with an edition of seven cast in bronze. This was a particularly significant time as the end of conflict meant a renewed availability of metals and Moore was able to break free from the constraints of two dimensions and work more regularly in three. Reclining Figure is therefore one of the first sculptural examples of what the artist had absorbed through his graphic observations of the public sheltering from The Blitz in the London underground. The undulating profile of the sculpture draws on both the example of a body sheltering on the platform floor and the artist's early preoccupations with the naturalistic rendering of bones, rocks and mountainous landscape, as such she can be read as both abstract and human at the same time. Writing of the scaled up carving of the present form, John Russell writes 'After many Reclining Figures in which the central hole was the dominant compositional feature here is one in which, on the contrary, the central area is filled in. Such is the modelling of that area that two complementary movements are set up: one begins below the heart and swings up and away to the left, while the other begins at the bottom of the right thigh and swings up and away to the right. The relationship, here, between the thing seen and the thing imagined is one of the most moving in all Moore's work, in that the spreading and subtly modulated area between heart and knees is continuously alive in terms both of human anatomy and of the landscape-analogy, the sublimations of moorland and bluff, which Moore keeps going at the same time. This is not one of Moore's largest carvings – it is only thirty inches long – but it is one in which social duty is laid aside and the imagination runs free to glorious effect.' (John Russell, Henry Moore, The Penguin Press, London, 1968, p.177)Another example from this edition is in the collection of the Memorial Art Gallery, University of Rochester, U.S.A.We are grateful to the Henry Moore Foundation for their assistance in cataloguing this lot.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Victor Pasmore R.A. (British, 1908-1998)Abstract in Brown, White, Pink and Ochre signed with initials 'VP' (lower right)oil on board68.1 x 83.8 cm. (27 x 33 in.) (including the artist's backboard)Painted in 1951-2Footnotes:ProvenanceThe ArtistWith Arthur Tooth & Sons, London, May 1959, where purchased bySir Martyn BeckettHis sale; Christie's, London, 8 June 2001, lot 157With Jonathan Clark & Co, London, 14 September 2001, where purchased byRoss D. Siragusa Jr., from whom acquired by the present ownerPrivate Collection, U.K.ExhibitedLondon, Institute of Contemporary Arts, Victor Pasmore Paintings and Construction 1944-1954, March-May 1954, cat.no.22 (as Oval Motif No. 2, 1951)Cambridge, Arts Council Gallery, Victor Pasmore: Selected Works 1926-1954, February-March 1955, cat.no.29London, Redfern Gallery, Victor Pasmore, June 1955, cat.no.16London, Arts Council Gallery, Three Masters of Modern British Painting, 1958, cat.no.37 (as Oval Motif in White, Brown, Pink and Maroon)London, Arthur Tooth & Sons, Today and Yesterday, February 1959, cat.no.7London, Tate Gallery, Victor Pasmore Retrospective Exhibition 1925-65, 14 May-27 June 1965, cat.no.103 (as Oval Motif in Brown, White, Pink and Ochre No.2)Bradford, Cartwright Hall, Victor Pasmore, organised by Arts Council of Great Britain, 2 February-9 March 1980, cat.no.22; this exhibition travelled to Liverpool, Walker Art Gallery, 15 March-11 May, Norwich, University of East Anglia, Sainsbury Centre, 20 May-15 June, Leicester, Leicestershire Museum and Art Gallery, 21 June-20 July, Newcastle upon Tyne, Laing Art Gallery, 26 July-25 August and London, Royal Academy, Diploma Galleries, 13 September-19 October 1980LiteratureLawrence Alloway, Nine Abstract Artists, Alec Tiranti Ltd., London, 1954, pl.45Alan Bowness and Luigi Lambertini, Victor Pasmore: A Catalogue Raisonne of the Paintings, Constructions and Graphics 1926-1979, Thames & Hudson, London, 1980, cat.no.173, p.103 (col.ill)Only a handful of abstract works by Victor Pasmore dating from the first half of the 1950s have appeared at auction over the past thirty or so years. They are incredibly rare. Abstract in Brown, White, Pink and Ochre (1951-2) dates to the earliest part of the decade and is accompanied with impressive exhibition history, having been included in the artist's major Tate retrospective in 1965 amongst other shows. Like Ben Nicholson (who was fourteen years his senior) during the early 1920s, Pasmore had flirted with abstraction at a specific moment in the early 1930s before he founded the Euston Road School. He joined the London Artists' Association in 1933 and with Sir William Coldstream and Claude Rogers participated in Zwemmer Gallery's notable 1934 show, Objective Abstractions. Only, Pasmore's contribution to the exhibition was not abstract but instead showed the influence of the Fauves and Cubists; Matisse and Picasso being the sources of his early inspiration. Unfortunately, the handful of abstract works Pasmore produced following the show, partly guided by Ben Nicholson's new avant-garde approach to his painting, were destroyed by him. As the decade wore on and Pasmore established his teaching, first at Fitzroy Street then Euston Road, pupils were directed to the naturalistic aesthetic of Degas, Cézanne, Sickert and Bonnard. Up until the mid-1940s this is the direction Pasmore's painting travelled in, but as the war drew to an end, experimentation began to re-appear. His Hammersmith paintings of the late 1940s show evidence of his interest in Seurat's Pointillism and Cezanne's later work with the use of multiple perspectives. Despite this, Pasmore felt unconvinced with his progress, and Ronald Alley in his introduction to Tate's retrospective exhibition describes the change which then occurred:'Therefore, in 1948 he decided to make a fresh start with abstract art and to explore all its possibilities in a completely scientific way, finding out what happened when one started with a square or a spiral or so on. He read the writings of Kandinsky, Mondrian, Arp and the other leading abstract artists, just as he had previously read those by the post-impressionists, and even made a compilation Abstract Art: Comments by some Artists and Critics, which was privately printed at the Camberwell School of Art in 1949. Knowledge of the post-war Parisian and American abstract movements had not reached England at the time and Pasmore's development was completely independent of them.' (Ronald Alley, Victor Pasmore, Retrospective exhibition 1925-65, Tate Publishing, 1965).To begin with, Pasmore's abstraction involved collages and two-dimensional paintings such as the present work with its complex colours, shapes and forms encased within an oval as a reflection on his dissatisfaction with the closed rectangle of easel painting. The first constructed reliefs had begun to appear by 1948 and were exhibited at Fitzroy Street in March 1952 and Redfern Gallery in May of the same year. Many of these and other works were sadly destroyed by the artist and opportunities to acquire examples such as Abstract in Brown, White, Pink and Ochre seldom present themselves.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Sir Gerald Festus Kelly RA, KCVO, PRA (British, 1879-1972)A Glass of Sherry in the Studio, Portrait of W. Somerset Maugham oil on canvas laid on board72 x 81.4 cm. (28 3/8 x 32 in.)Painted 1932-7Footnotes:ProvenanceThe Artist (until 1952), from whom acquired byBertram E. Alanson (1877-1958), San FranciscoPrivate Collection, U.S.A. ExhibitedLondon, Royal Academy, Summer Exhibition, 1 May-7 August 1933, cat.no.209 (as A Glass of Sherry in the Studio (W.S.M.))London, Royal Academy, Summer Exhibition, 1 May-7 August 1943, cat.no.39 (as W.S.M.: A Glass of Sherry in the Studio. (2nd. Version))Stanford, Albert M. Bender Room, Stanford University Library, A Comprehensive Exhibition of the Writings of W. Somerset Maugham Drawn from Various Collections and Private Collections, 25 May-1 August 1958, section III, item AFollowing graduation from Eton College and Trinity Hall, Cambridge, Gerald Festus Kelly embarked on an artistic career without any formal training. In 1901 he moved to Paris to broaden his education. There he made the acquaintance of Degas, Sickert and Sargent. However, it was another Irishman who he met in the city, the brash young novelist-playwright William Somerset Maugham, who would become Kelly's most enduring friend until the writer's death in 1965.Over the years the two men supported each other in various ways. In 1908 Maugham helped to fund Kelly's career-changing first trip to Mandalay, as a cure to get over an unhappy love affair. Thereafter Maugham used the artist as the basis for characters in several novels, such as Frederick Lewson in Of Human Bondage (1915) and Lionel Hillier in Cakes and Ale (1929-30), and finally he dedicated Ashenden (1927) to the artist. Kelly returned the favour, painting Maugham on roughly eighteen occasions including in A Jester (1911, Tate Gallery, London) considered one of the Artist's finest portraits.A Glass of Sherry was likely intended by Kelly to be both sequel and companion to The Jester. Indeed, the artist elected to show both portraits at the Royal Academy's 1933 summer exhibition, leading the critic Frank Rutter to declare that 'Mr. Kelly has definitely established himself as the premier portrait-painter of the year' (Sunday Times, 30 April 1933, p.12).Following this outing the picture remained in the Artist's possession. In 1937 Kelly reworked the canvas, replacing a decanter positioned on the table to the left with two books and moving the grey bowl a touch to the right. He added a second canvas facing the wall behind the portrait of Princess Saw Ohn Yung and introduced a tube of paint on the easel. Kelly later subtly adjusted the sitter's expression, turning the corners of the mouth upward into a self-confident half smile and shifting his gaze so that he addressed the viewer directly. Pleased with the results, and perhaps capitalising on his position as President to circumvent the Academy's rule that no work should be exhibited twice, the picture was included in the Summer Exhibition for a second time in 1943.It is following this outing that the work was sold by Kelly to Maugham's closest American friend, Bertram E. Alanson. Alanson was a stockbroker who later became head of the San Francisco Stock Exchange. As well as being entrusted by Maugham with his finances, Alanson amassed one of the most important collections of the author's writings ever assembled, most of which he later bequeathed to Stanford University. Following Alanson's death in 1958, the work's whereabouts were untraced until its recent rediscovery. A welcome re-addition to the canon of 20th Century portraiture, A Glass of Sherry stands as a testament to the dear friendship between these two highly celebrated men.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: * AR* VAT on imported items at a preferential rate of 5% on Hammer Price and the prevailing rate on Buyer's Premium.AR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Dame Elisabeth Frink R.A. (British, 1930-1993)Mirage II signed and numbered 'Frink / 4/5' (on the base)bronze with a dark brown patina91.4 cm. (36 in.) highConceived in 1967Footnotes:ProvenanceWith Osborne Samuel, London, where acquired byPrivate Collection, U.K.Their sale; Bonhams, London, 18 November 2015, lot 56, where acquired by the present ownerPrivate Collection, U.K.ExhibitedLondon, Waddington Galleries, Elisabeth Frink, 11 October-4 November 1972 (another cast)Wakefield, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Elisabeth Frink: Open Air Retrospective, 21 July-14 November 1983 (another cast)London, Royal Academy of Arts, Elisabeth Frink, Sculpture and Drawings 1952-1984, 8 February-24 March 1985 (another cast)Hong Kong, The Rotunda, Exchange Square, part of Hong Kong Festival, Elisabeth Frink: Sculpture & Drawings, 31 January-31 March 1989 (another cast)Washington, The National Museum for Women in the Arts, Elisabeth Frink: Sculpture and Drawings 1950-1990, 1990 (another cast)London, Beaux Arts, Frink: Sculpture, Drawings and Prints, 1998 (another cast)London, Beaux Arts, Frink, 2006 (another cast)London and Bath, Beaux Arts, Frink, 2009 (another cast)LiteratureEdwin Mullins, The Art of Elisabeth Frink, Lund Humphries, London, 1972, cat.no.91 (ill.b&w., another cast)Jill Wilder, Elisabeth Frink, Sculpture Catalogue Raisonné, Harpvale, Salisbury, 1984, p.171, cat.no.162 (ill.b&w., another cast)Annette Ratuszniak, Elisabeth Frink, Catalogue Raisonné of Sculpture 1947-93, Lund Humphries, London, 2013, p.108, cat.no.FRC187 (ill.b&w., another cast)Like her contemporaries whose work of the period was generalised under the term 'Geometry of Fear', Frink in the late '50s and '60s engaged with the heavy sense of dread that came from living in a newly nuclear-enabled world. She called upon the symbolism of birds as harbingers of this potential catastrophic violence. They appeared as blinded, sharp-beaked aggressors, distorted and stalking which took on an archaic form and crowed towards unknown horrors. This brutal aesthetic dominated her output until 1967 when she moved to the south of France. The light brighter and the air warmer, her entire output shifted accordingly. The Mirage works were the first bird pieces produced there and although they retain many similar qualities to their predecessors, they are decidedly more evolved. Inspired by local flamingos, which when viewed from afar in intense heat, became distorted by mirage to become even more slender, the sculptures' surface becomes smoother and more finessed and the form sleeker and more stylised.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Roger Hilton (British, 1911-1975)Painting, October 1959 signed, inscribed and dated 'HILTON/30 X 54/OCT'59' (verso)oil on canvas76.3 x 137.2 cm. (30 x 54 in.)Footnotes:ProvenanceWith New Art Centre, London, circa 1970, where purchased by the present ownerPrivate Collection, U.K.The mid-to-late 1950s saw turbulent times for Roger Hilton. Artistically, he was wrestling with the problem of how an artist develops upon abstraction. Professionally, he chose to cut ties with his long-time dealer, Gimpel Fils, due to perceived pressures to mould his output into a more commercial form, leaving him in a position of financial uncertainty. And personally, his marriage to Ruth David was waning, ultimately ending in divorce. Yet these years bore triumphs. Hilton's first retrospective was held at the ICA in early 1958, which led to the Tate Gallery and the Arts Council both making their first acquisitions of his work, with further purchases made by both the following year along with the Gulbenkian Foundation and Ferens Art Gallery in Hull. He was awarded a prize at the prestigious John Moores Exhibition in Liverpool in 1959 and his work was included in several important mixed exhibitions such as the 1957 Lawrence Alloway organised Metavisual Tachiste Abstract: Painting in England Today.Out of this period, both personally and artistically, several key developments emerge. In the summer of 1956, he took a studio in St Ives and then in Newlyn the following three years, beginning an engagement with the South-West that would later be cemented by a permanent move. In London too he found a new studio in St. John's Wood, in which he would increasingly reside when in the capital. At the end of the decade Hilton joined the stable of Waddington Galleries, who offered the security of a £360-a-year stipend, which enabled him to give up his teaching position at the Central School of Art and led to a series of highly praised and commercially successful exhibitions. And by 1959 he had met fellow painter Rose Phipps, who would spend that summer with him in Newlyn, and who he would later marry.Dating to October of that very year, the present work, and other such examples, display a new bravado from an artist who had already developed a highly confident manner of working. The hardened edges of his earlier neo-plastic forms give way to rolling masses, armatures and details utilised in such a balanced economy of mark-making that they become highly suggestive. An audaciousness enters his technique; charcoal traditionally associated with underpaintings is purposefully laid bare or, as in the current example, unmixed pigment is tubed directly onto the canvas. Whilst his idiom presents initially as abstract, reference points are increasingly identifiable with his most returned to source being the female form. Writing in 1961, Hilton concluded how at least artistically he had resolved the various quandaries this period had presented him with:'Abstraction in itself is nothing. It is only a step towards a new sort of figuration, that is, one which is more true. However beautiful they may be, one can no longer depict women as Titian did. Renoir in his last pictures had already greatly modified her shape... For an abstract painter there are two ways out or on: he must give up painting and take to architecture, or he must reinvent figuration' (ex.cat., Roger Hilton & Alan Bowness, Roger Hilton, Galerie Charles Lienhard, Zurich, 1961)This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Paul Feiler (British, 1918-2013)Trencrom signed, titled and dated 'PAUL FEILER/TRENCROM/1961' (verso)oil on canvas45.7 x 35.2 cm. (18 x 14 in.)Footnotes:ProvenancePrivate Collection, U.K.Sale; Dreweatt Neate, Newbury, 18 May 2010, lot 174Private Collection, U.K.With the proceeds from his first one-man exhibition at The Redfern Gallery in early 1953, Feiler bought a disused chapel at Kerris near Newlyn, which he converted for use as a studio. From this date the Cornish landscape became a prominent feature in his painting. Initially such examples consisted of specific visual references but, as his manner of working became increasingly abstract across the decade, by the early 60s Feiler's aim was to express the experience of a given location rather than of its representational features. He comments:'Woven into my paintings are visual memories of physical experience of a landscape, and therefore the atmospheric quality of Cornwall is there such from sea to sky. I feel I have retained this within the non-landscape pictorial concept... One constantly travels to the coast in order to get that kind of relationship that, it seems to me, should be the Cornish quality, the Cornish atmosphere' (Paul Feiler in interview with Michael Tooby, exhibition catalogue, Paul Feiler: Form to Essence – Theme and Development, Tate St Ives, June 1995).Located roughly ten miles north east of Feiler's studio, Trencrom Hill affords views north to St Ives and Carbis Bay. In addition to Feiler, the hill informed other key artists of the period such as Ben Nicholson (March 1949 (Trencrom)) and Peter Lanyon (Trencrom, 1951).This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Rex Whistler (British, 1905-1944)Longcross House signed and dated 'Rex Whistler 1934' (lower right)oil on canvas71.2 x 137.2 cm. (28 x 54 in.)Footnotes:ProvenanceMajor Charles Micklem, thence by family descentPrivate Collection, U.K.One of the 1920s so called 'Bright Young Things', Rex Whistler's prodigious talent and renowned charm positioned him as a favourite artist amongst well-heeled and bohemian circles of the inter-war period.Born in 1905 in Kent, the son of an architect, at the age of just seven Whistler entered a work to the Royal Drawing Society, winning an award. An achievement he would repeat for the following twelve years. He enrolled at the Slade in 1922, securing his first portrait commission the same year. He was awarded scholarships for his second and third years, and later an honorary bursary to the British School in Rome. Whilst still in his final year of the Slade, aged twenty one, Whistler secured a commission to paint a mural for the Tate Gallery, to this day one of his best known works and now the site of the Tate's Rex Whistler Restaurant.A society darling, Whistler painted portraits of many of his circle including Edith Sitwell and Cecil Beaton. He took commissions for stage design, including several Oscar Wilde plays, and illustrations for publishers, such as those to accompany Gulliver's Travels.Following the success of Whistler's Tate mural, a bounty of commissions came his way. These included esteemed patrons such as Lord and Lady Louis Mountbatten, Sir Duff and Lady Diana Cooper, Sir Philip Sasson, Sir Henry Channon and the Marquess of Anglesey, for whom he painted the highly celebrated mural at Plas Newydd.The present work was commissioned in 1934 by Major Charles Micklem (1882-1955). Micklem, a former stockbroker and senior partner for Cazenove & Co, had Longcross House near Chertsey in Surrey built as a home for his wife and six children. Whistler depicts the Major and his wife upon their new lawn which leads towards views of Cobham Common, whilst each of the children are engaged in various activities.Whistler was tragically killed in action in Normandy on the 18th July 1944, he was 39 years of age.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Alan Davie C.B.E., H.R.S.W., R.A. (British, 1920-2014)Little Resurrection signed, titled, inscribed and dated twice 'Alan Davie 63/LITTLE RESURRECTION/MAR 63/OPUS 0.517' (verso); titled, inscribed and dated again 'LITTLE RESURRECTION (UNTITLED NO 70) MAR 63' (on the stretcher)oil on canvas 122.3 x 101.7 cm. (48 1/8 x 40 in.)Footnotes:ProvenanceWith Gimpel Fils, LondonWith Alan Wheatley, London, where acquired by the present ownerPrivate Collection, U.K.ExhibitedLondon, Alan Wheatley Art, Alan Davie: An Inner Compulsion, Retrospective Exhibition, 18 April-4 May 2018, cat.no.30LiteratureAlan Bowness, Alan Davie, Lund Humphries, London, 1967, cat.no.452Little Resurrection is the first of four closely related compositions. Grand Flyaway (Resurrection) (Collection of Detroit Institute of Arts), Flyaway Resurrection No 2, Fly Away Little Happy One, and the present work, all painted in early 1963. These four works display recurrent motifs such as a skyward reaching ladder, what appears to be a winged form or child's rattle and a levitating skull, contained in a blazing yellow pictorial space. In summer of the same year Davie penned a short autobiographical passage entitled I Confess. In it he poetically details his childhood in Scotland, early studies in art, wartime experience, and time as a professional jazz musician. His conclusion to this passage resonates especially with these four works, providing context to their joyful exuberance and themes of flight and rebirth. He states:I married me a wife, and we went away together, and we found the mountains and the snows together, and the Italian sunshine, and the marvellous mosaic and the gold and white and pink and the bottlegreen sea. Then I really began to paint in the way I had learned to write and to play jazz and in the way I had learned to make love: and I learned that All is in me and I in All; and I discovered that I really am a child for evermore, and an animal still, thank God; just like them: my parrot my canary my poodles my dachshund my cats my budgerigars; they really know: and my little blond baby daughter knows too. All the talking and lecturing and teaching and philosophising and writing mean absolutely nothing.I discovered that I could be a bird (I had always longed to soar like the seagulls) and now I can fly amongst my clouds, and swoop and climb and circle in my big white sailplane.How much more important than Art, just to be a bird.(excerpt from I Confess, by Alan Davie, cited in exhibition catalogue Visione Colore, Venice, Palazzo Grassy, July-October 1963)This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Sir William Nicholson (British, 1872-1949)Alcazar Gardens oil on panel32 x 40.5 cm. (13 x 16 1/8 in.)Painted in 1933Footnotes:ProvenanceWith The Leicester Galleries, London, 1943Collection of Gordon Binnie by 1956, thence by family descentPrivate Collection, U.K.ExhibitedLondon, The Leicester Galleries, Paintings by Sir William Nicholson, April 1943, cat.no.26Hove, Hove Museum, An Exhibition of Work by Sussex Painters: Past and Present, 16 June–16 September 1951LiteratureLillian Browse, William Nicholson, Rupert Hart-Davis, London, 1956, p.104, cat.no.446 (dated 1935)Patricia Reed, William Nicholson: Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, Yale University Press, London & New Haven, 2011, p.531, cat.no.685William Nicholson's Spanish paintings of the 1930s are mainly associated with Malaga and the hills above the port: Plaza da Torres, Malaga (1935, Tate Britain) and the area around Segovia: The Road to Zamarramala (1936, Sheffield City Art Gallery) where he travelled with the novelist Marguerite Steen, who later wrote his biography. However Nicholson's first experience of Spain was a six week stay in Seville, January-February 1933. He was in the company of his old friend and patron, Mrs Ada Pringle, who had already made several visits to Spain. As she was recuperating after an operation they did not go far from their hotel in the centre of town.Seville, the birthplace of his favourite artist, Velazquez, delighted Nicholson. It was also his first introduction to Moorish design and architecture, and he paid frequent visits to the Alcazar and its gardens. Made up of a series of compartment gardens that had evolved over the centuries and planted with myrtle hedges, orange groves, roses and many species of palms that Nicholson had never seen before, the whole area was overgrown and full of mystery.In the present work Nicholson has cropped the image in order to focus on the trunks of the palm trees – the oldest trees known to man. A Pindo palm or Jelly palm (Butia Capitata) appears left of centre, its trunk is covered with the stubs of dead palm leaves, their descendants – feathery palm fronds, curving gracefully down to the left. Unidentified palms to left and right with the diagonal of what is probably a young palm of the tall, spindly type with fan-shaped leaves that Nicholson had featured in Bombay Landscape and Bombay Outskirts (both 1915), and also in his pen and ink street scenes of 1920, such as Place de la Liberté (Sold in these rooms, 11 November 1999, lot 227). In the shadows of the middle distance (right) a couple move along an unseen path – the woman in a purple kaftan and the man in a striped shirt. The foreground left is animated by a pair of white doves. The limited palette, use of impasto and strong shadows add to the drama. We are grateful to Patricia Reed for compiling this catalogue entry.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Ivon Hitchens (British, 1893-1979)The Village Forge (Heyshott Sussex) signed 'HITCHENS' (lower left)oil on canvas45.6 x 50.9 cm. (18 x 20 in.)Painted in 1926Footnotes:ProvenanceThe Artist, December 1926, from whom purchased byMrs Amber Blanco White, thence by family descentPrivate Collection, U.K.The Village Forge (Heyshott Sussex) is a particularly strong example of Hitchens' mid-1920s work, with its energetic brushwork, considered composition and distinctive atmosphere created by the various shades of grey in the sky contrasting with the golden roof tops and brightly lit foreground below.Painted in 1926 and purchased by the current owner's late grandmother directly from Hitchens, the painting has never been exhibited or published. A year earlier, in December 1925, Hitchens enjoyed his first one-man exhibition at the Mayor Gallery on Sackville Street, and it was the artist's friend, W.G. Constable, who wrote a foreword for the catalogue:'Today, in reaction from nineteenth century pre-occupation with dramatic content, or with representation of natural appearance, the younger painters are chiefly interested in problems of design – of bringing colour and form into harmonious and rhythmical relation. So the main purpose which runs through Mr. Ivon Hitchens' work, is to express the inner harmony and rhythm which he feels, rather than sees, running through and uniting any group of forms; to strip, as it were, the veil of the familiar from the unfamiliar through the medium of his own temperament.' (Peter Khoroche, Ivon Hitchens, André Deutsch, London, 1990, p.25).This passage also relates well to the present lot with its rhythmic forms of the central elm tree uniting those of the impending squall of the clouds behind. Even the brushstrokes of the forge's roof complement those used to describe the foliage and thus the 'inner harmony' of this accomplished picture is achieved.We are grateful to Peter Khoroche for his assistance in cataloguing this lot.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
GEORGE HOUSTON RSA RSW (SCOTTISH 1869 - 1947), DUNTRUNE CASTLE oil on canvas, signed 71cm x 91cm Framed Provenance: Private Glasgow collection. Acquired J&R Edmiston Auctioneers, 166A Bath Street, Glasgow 18 September 1968 (lot 44) where catalogued "Wooded Landscape and Loch". Note: Duntrune Castle is located on the north side of Loch Crinan and across from the village of Crinan in Argyll, Scotland. In 1562 Donald McGillespic Vic O'Challum received the lands of Poltalloch from Duncan Campbell of Duntrune in return for certain services. Two hundred years later, the O'Challums (now anglicised to Malcolm) bought out the Campbells. Today their direct descendants still occupy Duntrune and farm the land. Situated at the narrows between deep water and a tidal loch, Duntrune was built to guard the glens of Kilmartin and Kilmichael from seafaring marauders. Always a Campbell stronghold in those days, it was never the scene of a major conflict, and is now accepted as the oldest continuously inhabited castle in Scotland. The vaulted rooms on the ground floor date from the 12th Century, and the remainder of the keep from the 16th. The ghost is well-authenticated, handless piper, whose musical warning "Cholla mo Run, Seachain a Dun" saved his master Colkitto McDonald from a Campbell ambush. Four thousand years before the first Campbell, neolithic man gave up a nomadic hunting life to settle where the land drained easily and responded to his simple implements. The Scots of Dalriada came later, attracted not only by the fertility of the area, but also because it was central to their kingdom and all outposts were easily reached. So it is today. (This text from the Duntrune Castle website, with the kind consent of the Malcolm family of Duntrune).
SIR JOHN LAVERY RA RSA RHA (IRISH/BRITISH 1856 - 1941), SKETCH, THE HOSPITABLE GATE oil on panel, signed, titled and dated '86 26.5cm x 40.5cm Framed Provenance: Sotheby's, London, 22 July 1987. lot 150. Sotheby's, London, 6 May 2010, lot 4. Note: John Lavery was welcomed as a celebrity by collectors in Paisley after his return from France at the end of 1884. They were impressed by avant-garde ambitions expressed in large canvases such as On the Loing, An Afternoon Chat, (Ulster Museum, Belfast), shown at the Glasgow Institute of Fine Arts in February 1885. Although he established a studio in Glasgow, these wealthy middle-class local worthies were keen to retain his services. The wool and cotton manufacturer, James Fulton, for instance, offered Lavery a cottage/studio, close to his baronial mansion on his estate at The Glen, Paisley, while the artist produced portraits of members of his family. William MacKean, a soap manufacturer and the town’s Provost also provided portrait commissions and some of these are likely to have been shown at the artist’s first solo exhibition at the George A. Clark Town Hall at the end of November 1886. This grand edifice was funded four years earlier by the Clark family, owners of Anchor Mills, one of Paisley’s principal employers, who were also Lavery patrons. No catalogue for Lavery’s first show is known to be in existence, but he advertised it as ‘Portraits, Pictures & Sketches painted in the Neighbourhood’. We may however assume that in addition to views of The Glen, and smaller pictures painted in the garden of the MacBrides’ house at nearby Cathcart, where Lavery had worked on his most famous canvas, The Tennis Party, (Aberdeen Art Gallery), the exhibition also contained sketches like that of the ‘Hospitable Gate’. An earlier street scene, Lady on a Safety Tricycle 1885, (Government Art Collection), is however thought to be an entrance to Cartbank. This tentative watercolour lacks the bold handling, vivid realization and atmospheric qualities of Sketch of The Hospitable Gate. The swift notation and autumnal palette of this suburban street scene indicates that it was painted shortly before Lavery’s exhibition opened. Although there is little detail of the house, it is possible that it represents Chapel House in Ardgowan Street, Paisley - then on the fringe of the Blackhall Estate and the river White Cart Water. In the 1880s this four-square Georgian house on a leafy lane, was owned by James Clark, one of the brothers who inherited Anchor Mills. The building’s square façade, its placing in relation to the street, and the shallow pitch to its roof, suggests that the ‘hospitable gate’ could lead to just such a house.
* IAN FLEMING RSA RSW RGI (SCOTTISH 1906 -1994), SHELTERS IN A TENEMENT LANE etching, signed and titled in pencil 21cm x 15cm Mounted, framed and under glass Provenance: Exhibited Royal Scottish Academy Annual Exhibition (Edinburgh) 1942 catalogue number 502. Note: Ian Fleming was a notable artist and engraver and played an important role in the Scottish art world. He was successively a lecturer at Glasgow School of Art for many years and Warden of Patrick Allen-Fraser Art College at Hospitalfield and Principal of Gray's School of Art, Aberdeen. He was a brilliant etcher, a practice he continued into old age. Fleming was born in Glasgow and studied at the Glasgow School of Art. He began printmaking at art school, and Glasgow Art Gallery bought two of his prints while he was still a student. In 1928, Fleming made his first engraving, inspired by Charles Murray (see lot 114). Murray's influence over Fleming was considerable and Fleming learned quickly, soon becoming a highly-skilled engraver. While lecturing at the Art School from 1931, Fleming met William Wilson, the Edinburgh-based printmaker and stained glass artist. They became friends, and their work was mutually influential. He also taught Robert Colquhoun and Robert MacBryde ("the two Roberts") during this time. Fleming produced detailed etchings and engravings of Glasgow, the Scottish Highlands and the Continent.
* CHARLES MURRAY (SCOTTISH 1894 - 1954), CHRYSANTHEMUMS oil on board 64cm X 44cm Framed (original) Provenance: Exhibited: City of Bradford Art Gallery, Cartwright Memorial Hall, Jubilee Exhibition 1954, Exhibit No. 770 (label verso). James Bourlet & Sons label verso no H 2611. Artist's label verso, partially obscured by owners (loan) label: Mr E Grierson, Greystead, Tarset, Hexham, Northumberland. Note: Charles Murray's oil paintings rarely appear at auction and, as he often left his work unsigned, some invariably aren't attributed to him. In October (20th) 2018 Tennants (Leyburn) offered "Crinan, Scotland" a small (23.5 x 35cm) watercolour with Leicester Galleries (London) "Artists of Fame & Promise Exhibition" provenance, which sold for £1600 (hammer). Charles Murray was born in Aberdeen and studied at the Glasgow School of Art for three years. He served with the ‘White Army’ in Russia from 1918-20, joining a diverse group of counter-revolutionary forces who fought against the Bolsheviks. On his return to Glasgow, Murray won the highly coveted "Prix de Rome" for etching and studied at the British School in Rome from 1922-25. He travelled extensively in Europe but came back to Scotland in 1926 to teach engraving at the Glasgow School of Art, and later lived in Leeds and Middlesex. He produced paintings and etchings in a style influenced by Mannerism. Murray had his first major one-man show at The Leicester Galleries (London) in 1946 and another at Batley Art Gallery in 1950. There was a Memorial exhibition at Temple Newsam House (Leeds Museum & Art Galleries) in 1955 and an Edinburgh International Festival show at the Merchant Company Hall in 1977. Murray's paintings have always attracted academic acclaim and the Tate bought one of his paintings in 1940. Thirty of his paintings are held in UK Public collections including at Glasgow Museums & Art Galleries, the Arts Council Collection (Southbank Centre), Bradford Museum & Galleries, the Ferens Art Gallery, The Hepworth, Leeds Art Gallery and Museums, Kirklees Museum & Galleries, Sheffield Museums, Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museums and Tate (London).
* ROBERT SARGENT AUSTIN RA PRWS PRE (BRITISH 1895-1973) THE BALLET DRESS watercolour on paper, signed; titled verso 52.5cm x 59cm Mounted, framed and under glass Note: Robert Austin's watercolours very rarely appear at auction, anywhere. Note 2 : Robert Sargent Austin’s talent was first recognised publicly, as a precocious eight year old, when he successfully submitted work to the Royal Drawing Society in his hometown of Leicester. His friends would later say that art became to him as essential as breathing, and this early success marked the beginning of a daily drive to draw, paint and etch that would mould him into the artistic force that he became. Natural talent led to his enrolment at the Leicester Municipal School of Art in 1909, from where he won a scholarship to the Royal College of Art in 1914. In London, serious, patient, comprehensive study of life drawing was the first discipline taught and can be singled out as the experience that most influenced his uncompromising attitude to learning and practising art. The First World War interrupted his progress; he served as a gunner in the Royal Artillery from 1915-1919, however the delay meant that he became a pupil of the famous etcher, Sir Frank Short, when he resumed his studies. Robert Sargent Austin’s career was notable for the ease with which he perfected different artistic techniques, and his etchings under Sir Frank Short were so proficient that he won a scholarship to the British School in Rome in 1921. In Rome he befriended and worked with Charles Murray (see lot 114). This was an unrivalled opportunity to be immersed in Italian artistic culture and if his methodology was formed at the Royal College of Art, then his style was most influenced by this period of discovery. Through extensive travel around the country and careful study of the landscape and paintings, particularly the prints of the Old Masters, he found a source of influence that perfectly suited his own exacting practice of art. Additionally this also convinced him that line engraving was more suited to his temperament than etching. Mastering this new technique with ease he returned to England in 1926, a married man since 1923, and took up the post of Professor of Engraving at the Royal College of Art. He held this post until 1944 and the teaching of art quickly became as important to him as its practice. Pupils remember him as tough, frightening and often brutally honest, but found him an inspirational, dedicated teacher who would devote himself to students that showed enthusiasm. He was interested only in the execution of art; when he was given his new college name-plate he hung it over his lavatory door at home, highlighting a lifelong disinterest in the aggrandisement of ‘Art’ and its multifarious pretensions. A former pupil remembers him saying “We can talk about Art later, let’s find out how to draw first.’ He was promoted to the role of Head of Graphic Design at the Royal College of Art in 1948, but turned down the position of Principal as he wanted to remain an artist not an administrator. Robert Sargent Austin’s purchase of a studio at Burnham Overy Staithe, Norfolk, in 1935 and the lives of his three children most influenced the content of his output. The Norfolk wildlife fascinated him (he particularly adored birds) and the landscape he found there stirred him to paint; his family remember him rising before dawn most days to capture the summer light at its purest between five and seven. The activities of his growing children, both in Norfolk and London, were his other constant source of artistic subject matter as the selection in this show demonstrates. During the Second World War he was appointed official war artist to the Royal College of Art at Ambleside and his art became temporarily dominated by the Woolwich Arsenal, nurses, fighter pilots and other workers, particularly women, whom he felt were under represented in the War effort. The Imperial War Museum now holds thirty four of these pieces. The 1940s and 50s were dominated by a series of prestigious appointments and commissions in recognition of his prodigious talent. He was elected to the Royal Academy in 1948, made President of the Royal Watercolour Society in 1956 and asked to design the Bank of England’s new bank notes in the same year. In 1962 he was also elected President of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers. Essentially a humble man, he remained devoted to art for its own sake, uninterested in selling it or even receiving approval from others. Despite this, his pictures are now held in the collections of the Tate Gallery, The Victoria and Albert Museum, The Fitzwilliam Museum, The British Museum and The Ashmolean Museum and a huge retrospective of his work was held at the latter in 1980.
SIR JOHN LAVERY RA RSA RHA (IRISH 1856 - 1941), THE GARLANDED BALLERINA oil on canvas, signed and dated '96 61cm x 33cm Framed. Provenance: Sale; Christie's, Glasgow, 20 May 1987, lot 222. Sale; de Veres, Dublin, 11 June 1996, lot 69. Private Collection, from whom acquired by the present owner in the early 2000s. Private Collection, Ireland. Note: Sir John Lavery was an artist widely associated with the Glasgow Boys movement (1880-1900), with whom he shared an interest in subjects from modern life. He enjoyed great success after his move to London in 1896, where he combined his talents as a portrait painter with an interest in contemporary events. The painting offered here was executed in his first year in London (1896) and it is likely that Lavery attended his first major ballet in this period and was to form a lifelong fascination with the subject. This is clearly demonstrated in the highly acclaimed painting of the Ballerina Anna Pavlova (1911) held in the collection of The Kelvingrove Museum.
WILLIAM WOODHOUSE (BRITISH 1857–1939), BADGER watercolour on paper, signed 25cm x 36cm Mounted, framed and under glass. Note: William Woohouse, a Lancashire artist, had a love for all creatures great and small. He excelled in painting animals, especially horses and dogs. He painted birds, land and seascapes and a few family portraits. Woodhouse painted many local scenes around Morecambe, Heysham and surrounding area, including ‘the men of the bay’ at work. Before the first World War he painted mainly in oils, some of his greatest works were his sporting pictures, which included his gun dogs Jess and Turk. His Royal Academy exhibits featured animals native to North America and Canada. After the first World War when it became more fashionable Woodhouse painted in watercolour. Increasingly, rural nostalgia with glimpses of country life became a popular form of art. With a great eye for detail many of Woodhouse’s pictures are of historical value as they depict accurately a bygone era.
EDMUND THORNTON CRAWFORD RSA RSW (SCOTTISH 1806 - 1885), ON THE FARM oil on canvas, signed 46cm x 61cm Framed Note: Crawford was a landscape and marine painter, born at Cowden, near Dalkeith, in 1806. He was the son of a land surveyor, and when a boy was apprenticed to a house-painter in Edinburgh. He entered the Trustees' Academy under Andrew Wilson, where he had fellow-students David Octavius Hill and Robert Scott Lauder. William Simpson, who was one of the older students, became a close friend. Crawford's early paintings were exhibited in the Royal Institution, and his first contributions to the annual exhibition of the Royal Scottish Academy appeared in 1831, two of these being taken from lowland scenery in Scotland, and the third being the portrait of a lady. Although not one of the founders of the Academy, Crawford was one of its earliest elected members. His name appears in the original list of associates, but having withdrawn from the body before its first exhibition, it was not until 1839 that he became an associate. Meanwhile he visited Holland for the first of what would be several times. He studied the Dutch masters, whose influence in forming his picturesque style was seen in nearly everything he painted. Despite acclaim and commercial success it was 1848 before he was elected a full academician. In the same year he produced his first great picture, ‘Eyemouth Harbour,’ which he rapidly followed up with other works of high quality which established his reputation as one of the greatest masters of landscape-painting in Scotland. Among these were a ‘View on the Meuse,’ ‘A Fresh Breeze,’ ‘River Scene and Shipping, Holland,’ ‘Dutch Market Boats,’ ‘French Fishing Luggers,’ ‘Whitby, Yorkshire,’ and ‘Hartlepool Harbour.’ He also painted in watercolours, usually working on light brown crayon paper, and using body-colour freely. The only picture he contributed to a London exhibition was a ‘View of the Port and Fortifications of Callao, and Capture of the Spanish Frigate Esmeralda,’ at the Royal Academy in 1836. The characteristics of his art are the old school of Scottish landscape-painting. This was not so realistic in detail as the modern school, but was perhaps wider in its grasp, and strove to give impressions of nature rather than the literal truth. In 1858 Crawford left Edinburgh and settled at Lasswade, but he continued to contribute regularly to the annual exhibitions of the Academy until 1877, maintaining to the last the high position he had gained early in life. He was at one time a keen sportsman with both rod and gun. He died at Lasswade 27 Sept. 1885, ‘Coast Scene, North Berwick,’ and ‘Close Hauled; Crossing the Bar,’ by him, are in the permanent collection of the National Gallery of Scotland and a further nineteen works are held in UK public collections.
WILLIAM WOODHOUSE (BRITISH 1857 – 1939), GROUSE IN FLIGHT oil on canvas, signed 50cm x 60cm Framed Note: William Woohouse, a Lancashire artist, had a love for all creatures great and small. He excelled in painting animals, especially horses and dogs. He painted birds, land and seascapes and a few family portraits. Woodhouse painted many local scenes around Morecambe, Heysham and surrounding area, including ‘the men of the bay’ at work. Before the first World War he painted mainly in oils, some of his greatest works were his sporting pictures, which included his gun dogs Jess and Turk. His Royal Academy exhibits featured animals native to North America and Canada. After the first World War when it became more fashionable Woodhouse painted in watercolour. Increasingly, rural nostalgia with glimpses of country life became a popular form of art. With a great eye for detail many of Woodhouse’s pictures are of historical value as they depict accurately a bygone era.
EDWARD ATKINSON HORNEL (SCOTTISH 1864 - 1933), WHERE LARKS SING AND SEABIRDS CALL oil on canvas, signed and dated 1913 79cm x 92cm (approximately 31 x 36 inches) Framed Partial labels attached in pocket verso: British Colonial Society of Artists, Winnipeg Exhibition 1914, inscribed with title, artist's name and address; together with City of Bradford Corporation Art Gallery, Cartwright Memorial Hall. Provenance: The same private Aberdeenshire collection as lot 101 (William Stewart MacGeorge) and lot 109 (George Houston). Note: Where Larks Sing and Seabirds Call is a similar basic composition as the much smaller The Little Goat-herders (also dated 1913). It's very likely that Hornel painted the smaller picture first and when he realised that the composition "worked" he opted to paint a much larger and more detailed version with significant additions and "improvements". Hornel was sufficiently impressed with Where Larks Sing and Seabirds Call, to select it to represent him at the major international exhibition in Winnipeg in 1914. Hornel painted relatively few paintings of this size but the similar proportioned (77.5 x 91.49cm) Easter (1905) was sold by Sotheby's (Gleneagles) lot 90, 29th August 2007 for £55,200 (premium). Several other works by Hornel dated 1913 have achieved strong prices at auction including Spring Flowers (63.5 x 77cm) which was sold by McTear's on 27th July 2016 (lot 1225) for £21,000 (hammer).
ARTHUR WILLIAM HEINTZELMAN (AMERICAN 1891 - 1965), LA VIERGE ET L'ENFANT JESUS (Smith 155) drypoint etching on cream laid paper, 1929; edition of 70, signed in pencil 30cm x 23cm Mounted, framed and under glass Note: Born in Newark, New Jersey, Arthur William Heintzelman was a painter, etcher, copyist, teacher, and curator. Raised in Providence, Rhode Island, he first studied art at the Rhode Island School of Design, where he subsequently taught, and also in Europe. In 1921, the Heintzelmans moved to Paris and made their home in France, subsequently moving to Switzerland in 1931 and remaining there until 1934, when they returned to the United States. Already widely respected as a printmaker prior to his departure for Europe, he became internationally famous during his years abroad and was - and is - regarded as one of the greatest etchers of the Twentieth Century. During his years in Paris, Heintzelman met Eugène Delatre, who became his printer for the remainder of his stay in Europe, and who taught Heintzelman the intricacies of fine art printmaking for which his atelier was justly famous. In appreciation for his contribution to French art and culture, Heintzelman was named to the Legion of Honour by the French government. Following his return to the United States, Heintzelman became the first Keeper of Prints at the Boston Public Library and served there from 1941 to his retirement in 1960. Thanks to his close relationship with the Delatre family, Heintzelman coordinated the gift of the comprehensive collection of prints by both Auguste and Eugène Delatre to the Boston Public Library. He was succeeded as Keeper of Prints by Sinclair Hitchings. Heintzelman also headed the Fine Arts department of the Rhode Island School of Design. He was awarded numerous international prizes for his etchings, and his works are found in museum collections through the US and Europe. Heintzelman belonged to numerous professional associations both in the US and abroad. He lived and worked in Boston, Marblehead, and Rockport, Massachusetts and in New York City. He died at Rockport, Massachusetts. The works of Heintzelman are documented in The Prints of Arthur Wm. Heintzelman, the catalog raisonné compiled by Donald Eugene Smith and published by the Boston Public Library (USA) in 2004.
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