British Paintings & Sculptures 2022

BRITISH PAINTINGS & SCULPTURES Jonathan Grant Galleries 280 Parnell Road Parnell Auckland New Zealand www.jgg.co.nz

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British Paintings & Sculptures 4 APRIL - 1 MAY 2022

Jonathan Grant Galleries www.jgg.co.nz 280 Parnell Rd Parnell Auckland New Zealand Ph: +64 9 308 9125 Email: jg@jgg.co.nz

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Dame Laura Knight was born on the 4th of August 1877 in Long Eaton, Derbyshire. She worked primarily in oils, engravings and watercolours.

Increasingly interested in the stage, Laura painted scenes of the theatre, ballet and circus life. Between the wars her pictures of the Big Top established her fame and reputation.

Elected as an official war artist during the Second World War, her early commissions were dictated by the convention that women artists should record women's subjects.

In 1929, she was made a Dame of the British Empire and in 1931 she received an honorary degree from St Andrews University. In the following year, Knight was elected president of the Society of Women Artists, a position that was held until 1967. In 1936, Knight was elected a full member of the Royal Academy all whilst publishing her first autobiography, Oil Paint and Grease Paint, that same year.

Following the death of her husband Harold Knight in 1961, Knight published her second autobiography, The Magic of a Line, to coincide with a retrospective exhibition consisting of 250 pieces of work at the Royal Academy – the first of its kind for a woman. Knight continued to exhibit right up until her death on the 7th of July 1970 in London.

Laura Knight

Basin in a Dressing Room Coloured pencil on buff paper 35 x 25 cm Signed 'Laura Knight' lower left Exhibited: London, Leicester Galleries, Exhibition of Works by Mrs Laura Knight ARA, March 1928 The subject of this painting is Gwen Ffrangcon-Davies in Jackson's Romeo & Juliet, 1924

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Sir William Russell Flint RA PRWS (1880-1969) was an enigmatic British artist who was lauded as one of the greatest watercolour painters of the twentieth century.

From the outset of his career Flint’s work won immediate favour, and exhibiting institutions were quick to give him official recognition.

Flint regarded himself ‘first and foremost a landscape painter’ and critics of the time considered him ‘one of the few Academicians who remained faithful to the classical past’. However, it was the artist’s depiction of beautiful young women that garnered him enormous popularity. Flint’s most iconic subject was Cecilia Green, the 22-yearold exotic beauty, who over the course of fifteen years became the artist’s trusted confidant and muse.

Flint’s work is found in numerous private and public collections, including the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester and the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool.

Flint died in London on December 30, 1969 at the age of 89, a celebrated and highly successful artist.

William Russell Flint The Blue Scarf, St Malo

Watercolour 25 x 35 cm Signed lower left W. Russell Flint Provenance: The Auckland Society of Arts c.1930s

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The Sloop Inn is an inn in St Ives, Cornwall, England, located on the wharf. It is one of the oldest inns in Cornwall. The public house is dated to 'circa 1312' although the present building was built in the 17th or 18th century. Made of granite rubble, with a slate roof, the Sloop Inn was the favourite of Victorian artists and the St Ives group including Louis Grier and many of his paintings hung there in earlier years.

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Christopher Wood, born in 1901, in Knowsley near Liverpool, spent much of his brief adult life travelling through Europe. He had previously trained as a painter at the Académie Julian in Paris where he met artists Pablo Picasso and Jean Cocteau.

A defining moment in Wood’s life was the walk he took with Ben Nicholson in the streets of St Ives in August 1928 when, through an open door, they spotted paintings of ‘dramatic sea voyages painted on an assortment of odd-shaped supports made from salvaged pieces of driftwood and cardboard torn from grocery boxes’. These paintings were from Alfred Wallis, an artist who became a great influence for Wood.

In April 1929, Wood held a solo exhibition at Tooth’s Gallery, London, where he met Lucy Wertheim, Frances Hodgkins’ gallerist friend and dealer. She purchased a work and arranged for an exhibition at her gallery the following year. In 1930, following a frenzied panic during his preparation for the Wertheim exhibition, Wood committed suicide although his mother refused to accept such a fate, ruling it an accident.

The working drawing of The Sloop Inn, St Ives is an exceptionally rare find. The work was in the artist’s family collection until 1959, after which it was acquired by Dr Leonard Hamilton, who contributed to the discovery of the double helix shape of DNA. The finished oil on canvas work is currently in the collection of the Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki. The viewer is instantly drawn to the subtle changes in the composition of the completed oil. The addition of a figure gazing out of the window, a ginger cat in the left foreground and perhaps one of the most intriguing additions or in this case replacements – is that of a small child. In the original drawing, the male figure is holding what appears to be his catch of fish, but this element is later altered when Wood chose to depict a fair haired child holding onto the man’s hand.

Christopher Wood The Sloop Inn, St Ives

Pencil on paper laid on card 21 x 31.1 cm Executed in 1926 Provenance: The artists family until 1959 Redfern Gallery London, purchased by Dr Leonard D Hamilton on 12 June 1959

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Felix Kelly was a New Zealand-born graphic designer, painter, stage designer, interior designer, and illustrator who lived the majority of his life in the United Kingdom. He sometimes signed his illustration and cartoon work Fix. All Felix Kelly’s paintings were meticulously executed, with precisely realized architecture set against misty landscapes of drooping ivy-swathed trees or craggy peaks. In the foreground might be steam trains, canal barges – or a red-and-white striped deckchair.

Felix Kelly

Oldany House Overlooking the River Alde Near Aldeburgh, Suffolk Oil on board 28 x 28 cm Signed and dated 1955 Illustrated: 'Country Life', September 12, 1957

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John Yardley was born in 1933 in Beverley, Yorkshire and began painting in the 1950s. He frequently chooses his subject matter for the interesting effects of light and atmosphere and his travels through England and Europe produce a wide range of watercolours that show a rare ability to convey all the atmosphere of a scene with just a few well placed brush-strokes.

He is a member of the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours where he has exhibited for over thirty years winning several awards. Yardley has been the subject of two documentaries on watercolour painting and three books have been written about his work, including The Art of John Yardley, published in 1990.

John Yardley

At Glyndebourne Watercolour 36 x 51 cm Signed

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As the son of well-known British artists John and Brenda Yardley the considerable artistic talent of Bruce Yardley (b.1962) comes as no surprise.

Bruce Yardley remains an immensely popular and successful impressionist. His paintings are always meticulously composed, his commitment is total – and admirable. As a viewer, it is impossible to resist.

Bruce Yardley completed his first oil paintings whilst still at school some twenty-five years ago, but like so many gifted artists, his initial career was not in painting. He trained as an historian at the universities of Bristol and Oxford, gaining his doctorate in the late 1980's before joining the wine industry, first in retail, then as a freelance wine-writer.

Bruce Yardley Hotel Goodies Oil on canvas 76 x 61 cm Signed

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Margaret Lovell (Hon) DFA FRBS RWA born in 1939, is an award-winning sculptor and a Fellow of the Royal British Society of Sculptors. She is also a Member of the Royal West of England Academy, and in 2012 was awarded an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters by the University of Leicester. Lovell trained at the Slade School of Art in London and the Academy of Fine Art in Florence.

Since the late 1950's Lovell's sculpture has been exhibited extensively in the UK. She has enjoyed many solo shows, the first being in 1965 at the Marjorie Parr Gallery, London, and more recently at the Royal West of England Academy, Bristol, and a retrospective "50 Years On" at Porthminster Gallery, St Ives.

Her work was featured in the national touring exhibition, Unpopular Culture, curated by the artist and ceramicist, Grayson Perry. The works for the show were selected from the Arts Council's collection and Lovell's sculpture featured in the exhibition catalogue.

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Margaret Lovell Eleftheria

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Bronze on slate 26 x 15 cm Edition 4/6 Signed, dated 2009

Kitty (Katharine) Church (later West) (1910-1999) was born in London and expressed an early desire to paint. She trained at the Brighton School of Art, the Royal Academy Schools 1930-33 and the Slade School of Fine Art 1933-34.

In 1933 she had her first solo exhibition with Lucy Wertheim’s gallery in London. She also exhibited with the New English Art Club and showed regularly with The London Group.

From 1937 to 1947 she exhibited at Lefevre Gallery, London. She was the subject of Frances Hodgkins' Double Portrait No.2, along with her husband Anthony West. This work is now held in the collection of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa.

Katharine (Kitty) Church Self Portrait

Oil on board 58.5 x 43 cm Signed & dated 1994 Provenance: Estate of Katharine Church

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Katharine (Kitty) Church The Gates at Eastbury, 1988 Watercolour 37 x 54 cm

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Signed & dated '88

Archibald Thorburn was born on 31st May 1860 at Lasswade near Edinburgh. He became Britain’s, and some would say, the world’s best wildlife artist of all time. By the age of thirty in 1890, he was regarded as the best to have been seen in Britain, and that reputation has remained intact and unchallenged ever since. He was the fifth son of the famous miniaturist Robert Thorburn who was a great favourite of Queen Victoria.

The young Archibald received much of his early training from his father, whose insistence upon anatomical accuracy and careful attention to detail was to stand the young man in good stead throughout his life.

Thorburn painted Queen Victoria three times and also painted the famous portrait of Prince Albert, which Victoria always kept upon her table.

Thorburn’s pictures, unlike many of the period, remain free from sentimentality, his creatures restless, wild and free. With deft touch and great economy, he cleverly captured the rigours of life in the countryside, be it by mountain tarn or lowland stubble.

Archibald Thorburn Speedwell with an Orange Tip Butterfly Watercolour 25.5 x 17.5 cm Dated May 23rd 1931 Signed

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Samuel John Lamorna Birch (1869 - 1955) was born in Egremont, Cheshire, the eldest son in a family of ten. Birch left school aged twelve on the death of his father, and worked as an office boy in Manchester. However, ill health forced him to leave the city and recuperate for a while at the home of a river bailiff, where he was introduced to fly-fishing. It was here that he began to sketch landscapes, a skill that he developed in his spare time after he returned to work as an industrial designer in a linoleum factory.

In 1902 he moved to Lamorna Cove, the area that provided him with his principal source of inspiration for the rest of his life. Lamorna provided Birch with an endless range of landscape subjects, especially because of his passionate interest in rivers. He set up a studio near the river at Lamorna, only half a mile from Lamorna Cove.

In 1947, the people of Cornwall presented two paintings by Birch to HM Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh on the occasion of their marriage.

Samuel John Lamorna Birch Cattle at a Cornish Farm Pond Oil on board 26.5 x 35 cm Signed & dated 1940 lower right

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Patrick Heron CBE, was born in 1920, in Headingley, Leeds. Heron was well known as an abstract and figurative artist, critic and writer.

Inspired by artists such as Matisse, Bonnard and Braque he became renowned for his exploration of colour and light.

He attended the Slade School of Art in London.

A major retrospective exhibition of his work was held at Tate Britain in 1998, and Heron won the Grand Prize at the John Moores Prize Exhibition in Liverpool in 1959 and the silver medal at the São Paulo Art Biennial in 1965.

His work is in a number of important collections, including The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh, The National Portrait Gallery in London, and many others. He died at his home in Cornwall, England on March 20, 1999, at the age of 79.

Patrick Heron

Six in Vermillion with Green in Yellow, 1970 Screenprint 77.5 x 59 cm Edition 38/100 Signed 24

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George Charles Haité was born in Bexley, Kent 1855. He was the son of designer George Haité. Haité was self-taught, beginning to paint at age 16. He painted in both oils and watercolours and designed wallpapers, leaded glass and metal work.

In 1873 he settled in London to concentrate on his design work, but from 1883 began exhibiting at the Royal Academy. He was also a member of the Royal Institute and the Royal Society of British Artists. Between 1883 and 1887, Haité was the President of the Langham Sketching Club and in 1908 he became the President of the London Sketch Club.

Alongside his prestigious reputation as an oil painter and watercolourist, Haité also made a name for himself as an illustrator, designing a cover of the well-known magazine 'The Strand'.

George Charles Haité At the Well, a Girl Picking Grapes on the French Riviera Watercolour 29.5 x 46.6 cm Signed lower right

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Keith Money was born in New Zealand, in 1935, of English parents whose backgrounds were East Anglia and London, and also France and Ireland. From the age of 21, the only child of that union settled in England, after acquiring a Diploma in Fine Arts at the prestigious Elam School in Auckland. Even at that stage, a certain polymath range was evident. The school thought his best subject was sculpture, and while they did not teach watercolour at all, it was the latter skill, which gained comment in the press when the young painter was still in his teens.

Throughout his wide-ranging career, Keith Money has painted a diverse range of subjects, and for a decade, his equestrian landscapes were sold at ‘top of the range’ prices. In the eighties, Money’s working hand was struck by a condition akin to that which affects some pianists, and his painting ceased for six years; then, almost miraculously, the hand righted itself, and Money picked up the art work where he had left off. Noticeably, his nuance and control, now, is that of a far younger man’s. Money is renowned for his subtle skies and the great facility of brushwork in his watercolour painting, and these works are known for their distinctive atmospheric qualities. His drawings demonstrate an outstanding natural draftsmanship, which was commented on by Dame Laura Knight, when the young artist was first in London. She was fascinated by his skill, and inscribed drawings of her own, to Money, “with love and admiration.”

Keith Money

Mill Reef at the National Stud in Cambridge, 1973 Oil on board 61 x 71 cm Signed

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Margaret Lovell Marine Flow

Bronze on granite 22 x 75 cm Edition 1/6 Dated 2012

Jonathan Grant Gallery 280 Parnell Rd Parnell Auckland New Zealand 1052 Ph: +64 9 308 9125 | Email: jg@jgg.co.nz www.jgg.co.nz