William Scott, R.A.

Mary Scott
Bernard Jacobson Gallery, London, 1 October 1990

London, Gimpel Fils, Poem for a Jug, 1980, no.6
London, Bernard Jacobson Gallery, William Scott, 1990, no.30

Norbert Lynton (intro. essay), William Scott, Modern British Masters Vol.1, London, 1990, unpaginated, no.30, illustrated
Norbert Lynton, William Scott, London, 2004, pp.336 and 338
Sarah Whitfield (ed.), William Scott Catalogue Raisonné of Oil Paintings Vol. 4, London, 2013, no.877, p.262, illustrated

Original canvas. There is very minor surface dirt to the canvas, with further areas of studio detritus. Further areas of the artist's workings are visible to the canvas. The work appears in very good overall condition. Ultraviolet light reveals no obvious signs of fluorescence or retouchings. Housed behind Perspex in a thick white wooden frame, float-mounted. Unexamined out of frame.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Conceived as part of a series of 26 and executed throughout 1979 until the early months of 1980, Poem for a Jug incorporates William Scott’s familiar still-life components, dominated by a simplified jug motif. The series was shown in its entirety at the Gimpel Fils gallery in 1980 and appears to have been developed from a group of four small 'jug' paintings shown in Toronto the previous year.

William Scott elaborates on the title he adopted for the series of works within a letter to Jean-Yves Mock dated 26^thApril 1980: 'My immediate problem for the catalogue when we discussed it last week was how to title so many works with the same subject. While at Coleford I arrived at the conclusion that one title could cover them all and inspired by Keats I decided to call it 'Poem for a Jug' using "Poem" rather than "Ode" and "Jug" rather than "Urn".' (Sarah Whitfield, William Scott, 2013, p.25).  Scott refers to John Keats’s 1819 poem Ode on a Grecian Urn, the final lines of which read: 'Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -that is all/Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know'.

Here, within Poem for a Jug No.6, one see the single jug suspended in space against flat ground, held in place, as it were by the two rounded shapes, half ambiguous, positioned by its side. This almost monochromatic distillation of the still-life theme, containing only three elements, demonstrates a minimalism of a fairly extreme kind; As Norbert Lynton suggests ‘with so few items to look at, almost all communication is carried by placing and visual weight.’ (Norbert Lynton, William Scott, Thames & Hudson, London, 2004, p.337-8)

It has been said that upon entering his studio, Scott, did not contemplate whether he was going to paint a figure or a still life, but whether was going to fill a space or empty it out. What, therefore is most arresting about this late work is that Scott does both; the canvas, devoid of all detail of process, is, at the same time, full of presence. With all object in a harmonious companionship, contained within their own space, the Poem for a Jung No.6 is free of hierarchy, free of mess and free of clutter. It is, instead, a still-life informed by and refined by the experience of space, as well as the logic of pure form.

We are grateful to the William Scott Archive for their kind assistance in cataloguing the present work, which is registered with the William Scott Archive as number 453.