Sold

Gilbert Spencer (1892 - 1979)

Study for Hebridean Memory, 1951

SKU: 6504
Pencil and watercolour, squared, on a folded sheet,  inscribed (canna!)
22 x 30 in. (55.8 x 76.2 cm)
Presentation:
framed

Size:
Height – 55.8cm x Width – 76.2cm

DESCRIPTION

Provenance:
Given by Spencer to John Nash



Gilbert Spencer painted Hebridean Memory, a landscape set on the small Island of Canna in the Scottish Inner Hebrides. He had holidayed there in 1947, staying with John Lorne Campbell who had bought Canna outright in 1938, and was now living there as its Laird with his wife Margaret in the prominent harbour property Canna House. Spencer and Campbell had been friends since the 1930s when they met in Oxford, where Spencer had been painting a series of murals depicting the Foundation of Bailliol College and Campbell was doing post-graduate work.
Hebridean Memory depicts several of Canna’s landmarks and the locals going about island activities ‚Äì farming and lobster and mackerel fishing ‚Äì whilst visitors sunbathe. Rum features in the distance with MacBrayne’s steamer on its way over. A vision of contentment and plenty, the only incongruity is the man with the gun: Campbell, who wanted the island to be a sanctuary for wildlife, did not allow shooting. The composition also includes a whimsical depiction in the right foreground of the artist and his older brother Stanley as their younger selves.
Spencer has written about the trials of working on such a large-scale canvas, and that Hebridean Memory took him three years (with several incarnations) to achieve. After Sixty Paintings for 51′ it was shown at the RA in 1955, but this is the first time it has been exhibited since then.


Disclaimer:
Modern British Art Gallery are continually seeking to improve the quality of the information on their website. We actively undertake to post new and more accurate information on our stable of artists.

We openly acknowledge the use of information from other sites including Wikipedia, artbiogs.co.uk and Tate.org and other public domains. We are grateful for the use of this information and we openly invite any comments on how to improve the accuracy of what we have posted.

THE ARTIST

Gilbert Spencer
Gilbert
Spencer
1892 - 1979

Painter, especially of landscapes, draughtsman, teacher and writer, and brother of the painter Stanley Spencer. Born at Cookham, Berkshire. Spencer studied at Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts, woodcarving at the Royal College of Art, 1911-12, then with Fred Brown and Henry Tonks at the Slade School of Fine Art, 1913-20. Between 1915 and 1919 he served in the army. Spencer had his first one-man show at the Goupil Gallery in 1923; he also exhibited at the RA (he was elected RA in 1960), NEAC, (of which he was a member), Leicester Galleries, RSA, Redfern Gallery and many other venues. Although he produced notable wall paintings for Holywell Manor, Oxford, 1934-6, Spencer made his name as a landscape artist working mainly in the English southern counties. At various times he taught at the Royal College of Art, Glasgow School of Art and Camberwell, serving meanwhile as an Official War Artist, 1940-3. His book Stanley Spencer appeared in 1961 and his autobiography, Memoirs of a Painter, in 1974. A retrospective exhibition was held at Reading in 1964. The Tate and many other public collections hold his work. He sometimes just signed his work GS. He lived in Hampstead and towards the end of his life near Reading, Berkshire.

MORE PICTURES BY ARTIST

SKU: 9279

Gilbert Spencer (1892 - 1979)

Portrait of RJA, 1951

£975.00

SKU: 9252

Gilbert Spencer (1892 - 1979)

The Artist’s Daughter, Gillian

£3,500.00

Private
SKU: 9227

Gilbert Spencer (1892 - 1979)

Shoeing ‘Orses