Sir William Nicholson 1872-1949

London, Marlborough Fine Art, Sir William Nicholson 1872-1949, March 1967, no.19, illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, p.18.

Vase and Books on a Red Table belongs to a small group of Nicholson’s still life paintings dating from around 1919 onwards that mark a definite shift in the concerns that he addresses. Mostly of relatively small size, they are notable for an informality of composition and wider, more colourful palette than he had previously used. Closer inspection reveals that this apparent informality is in reality very carefully built up, with the choice of objects and textures balancing each other supremely well. This change might be best seen by a comparison between Vase and Books on a Red Table and The Little Lustre Cup (Private Collection) of 1917. Both paintings feature the same lustre-ware vessel but the moods of the pictures are very different. The Little Lustre Cup is an almost entirely tonal exercise, with a range of creams, pale yellows and whites dominating the painting. With such surroundings, the eponymous lustre cup shines brightly, reflecting the light colours around it. In Vase and Books on A Red Table, the same object appears entirely different, the dark shadows of the studio glowing warmly above a stripe of red and green reflected from the tablecloth and books beneath. Other elements of the painting quietly give balance and harmony. The warm ochre of the wall directly beyond the cup is mirrored in the yellow of the spines of the well-thumbed paperbacks. The red of the cloth is picked up by the stick of sealing-wax in the cup. The mood is very much one of familiar and well-used objects, casually placed, yet very firmly held within the strong diagonal emphases that run across the painting.

Looking at the collection of objects, a certain literary air is noticeable. The pencil, quill and sealing-wax in the cup are all writers’ tools, and the paperbacks are, as noted above, well-read, not just shelf-fillers.