Edward Wadsworth, A.R.A.

Mrs Wadsworth, from whom acquired by David Enders, and thence by descent to the present owner

Hove, Hove Museum, loan exhibit, 1951(as 'The Consistency of Odd Things');
London, Festival of Britain, British Painting 1925-1950, 1951, with subsequent tour;
Manchester, City Art Gallery, Rutherston Loan Scheme;
Bradford, Cartwright Hall Art Gallery, Edward Wadsworth 1889-1949: A Genius of Industrial England, 12th October 1989 -14th January 1990, no.123, with tour to Camden Arts Centre, London;
Wolfsburg, Kunstmuseum, From Blast to Freeze: British Art in the 20th Century, 14 September 2002 - 19 January 2003, unnumbered catalogue, with tour to Les Abattoirs, Toulouse.

Barbara Wadsworth, Edward Wadsworth: A Painter’s Life, Michael Russell, Ltd., Salisbury 1989, no. W/A186;
Jonathan Black, Edward Wadsworth: Form, Feeling and Calculation, Philip Wilson Publishers, London 2005, cat.no.344, pp. 107 & 193, illustrated.

The board appears to be in excellent original condition and providing a very good sound support. There are two narrow horizontal scuffs to the paint surface at the extreme top edge (each c.2cm. in length ) but these are largely hidden by the mount. Two short vertical scratches are also visible at this extreme top edge (each c. 1cm.) and some retouching appears to have taken place to three tiny spots of possible surface damage below these (either side of the tip of the left-hand clay pipe). There is another tiny scratch (0.2cm.) near the lower right hand corner. Otherwise the paint surface appears to be in good original condition and stable throughout. Inspection under UV light reveals some later retouching to the three spots mentioned above, upper centre. It is also possible that some light retouching has taken place along the vertical outer edges of the string of green floats. Presented behind glass and a grey velvet mount in a simple gilt wood frame with occasional surface scratches but otherwise in good sound condition. Ready for the wall.
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Wadsworth refined his manner through the 1930s, using his own collection of marine objects as the basis for further paintings, but in the present work, the cork floats, ropes and blocks are combined with other, more varied, elements including a strong sense of trompe d'oeuil. The sunny seascape background had disappeared, replaced by the weathered, painted boards of the beach-side workshop. in Airy Nothings, the curled clay pipes, the producers of smoke which itself floats on the air, hang beside a badminton shuttlecock, tied by a string to the rope above. Yet the string and the shuttlecock, hanging in a way somewhat reminiscent of the work of the Spanish painter Juán Sanchez Cotán, whilst appearing solid, actually seem to exert no pull on the rope above and add to the air of weightlessness and illusion.