Robert John Scott (Bertie)

Bertie Scott at 20 years of age. Photo courtesy of McClure Archives
Bertie Scott at 20 years of age.  Photo courtesy of McClure Archives

It was 100 years today when William Scott’s younger brother Bertie was born in 1922.  Having set up a printing company with his older brother Charlie the business struggled to compete and it eventually folded.

Bertie then decided to emigrate to New Zealand in 1949 with his wife to be, the future looked bright for the couple as they settled into their adopted country, but tragedy once again struck the Scott family when his young life ended abruptly in 1951, the scaffolding he was working on collapsed and he was killed.

This was the fourth tragedy to occur for the Scott family.  William’s other brother, Hughie, had been killed in August 1942 in Operation Pedestal off Malta and his own father was killed fighting a fire in Enniskillen in 1927 followed by the sudden death of his baby sister Violet in 1931

Hugh Scott

Hugh Scott
Hugh Scott photographed in 1941

On 12 August 1942, William Scott’s brother Hugh was killed on board HMS Indomitable in ‘Operation Pedestal’ off the coast of Malta.  The aircraft carrier HMS Indomitable was on its way to rendezvous in Freetown, under Captain T H Troubridge with the code name Force K.

Whilst Hughie’s body was interred at sea, the war memorial in Enniskillen commemorates his sacrifice as a Royal Marine.

Based in London, whilst serving in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps, William Scott returned home to Enniskillen on compassionate leave.

An Orchard of Pears, No. 15, 1976 or 1977

An Orchard of Pears, No15, 1976 or 1977

An Orchard of Pears, No. 15
1976 or 1977
Oil on canvas
39.6 × 46.7 cm / 15½ × 18½ in approx.
Collection of ING Commercial Banking UK

This work was one of in the An Orchard of Pears Series. Charcoal lines visible under the paint indicate that Scott altered the position of several of the pears.

It was reproduced as An Orchard of Pears XV, 1976, at the Gallery Kasahara exhibition of 1977.

In 1988 it was purchased by the Bernard Jacobson Gallery, London, and in November 1992 it was included in a sale at Sotheby’s, London. Later, it was acquired by Barings Bank which, after its collapse in 1995, became ING Bank NV, becoming part of the ING Collection.

The ING Collection is an award winning corporate collection, focused on forward looking art.  ING UK have selected An Orchard of Pears, No. 15 as their work of their month.

Living the Landscape

Boats Cornwall, 1948
28 May – 25 September 2022

With the exhibition Living the landscape – Barbara Hepworth, Ben Nicholson and the artists of St. Ives 1939-1975, Museum Belvédère is the first museum in the Netherlands to pay attention to a special chapter in the history of modern art in Great Britain.

World-renowned artists such as Ben Nicholson and Barbara Hepworth turned the picturesque coastal town of St. Ives in Cornwall into a dazzling international arts center. The many artists who settled there for a short or longer period of time were mainly inspired by the age-old landscape, the sea and the connection between the local population and its environment. Far away from the big art centers and current developments, they found a personal style tailored to light, land and space. Continue reading “Living the Landscape”

William Scott

Berlin Blues series as shown at the Tate retrospective, 1972

It was 50 years ago that the retrospective exhibition William Scott: Paintings Drawings and Gouaches 1938-1971 was held at the Tate Gallery, London 19 April-29 May 1972.

This major exhibition was organised by Sir Alan Bowness in collaboration with the artist.

The Retrospective was designed by the artist’s son Robert Scott who set out the total layout and the wall positioning of every painting and drawing having made a scale model of the total installation.

He also designed the sophisticated overhead lighting grid which was to be used by the Tate in their main exhibition gallery for many years afterwards.

Postwar Modern New Art in Britain 1945-1965

Morning in Mykonos, 1960-61
Morning in Mykonos, 1960-61

A revelatory new take on art in Britain after the Second World War, a period when artists had to make sense of an entirely altered world.

Postwar Modern explores the art produced in Britain in the wake of a cataclysmic war. Certainty was gone, and the aftershocks continued, but there was also hope for a better tomorrow. These conditions gave rise to an incredible richness of imagery, forms and materials in the years that followed.

Focusing on ‘the new’, Postwar Modern features 48 artists and around 200 works of painting, sculpture, photography, collage and installation. It explores the subjects that most preoccupied artists, among them the body, the post-atomic condition, the Blitzed streetscape, private relationships and imagined future horizons. As well as reconsidering well-known figures, the exhibition foregrounds artists who came to Britain as refugees from Nazism or as migrants from a crumbling empire, in addition to female artists who have tended to be overlooked.

Morning in Mykonos, 1960-61 is one of five works by William Scott which can be seen at the exhibition. Continue reading “Postwar Modern New Art in Britain 1945-1965”

Wiltshire on Paper: Post-War Prints from the Bath Academy of Art

8 January – 2 April 2022
Equals, 1972
Equals, 1972

Centred on the Bath Academy of Art in Corsham, the decades following the Second World War, saw an explosion of creative printmaking in this corner of Wiltshire. The first in a series of displays celebrating the Golder-Thompson Gift to Chippenham Museum, the exhibition will include works by Clifford & Rosemary Ellis, Gillian Ayres, Howard Hodgkin, William Scott and many more.

OPENING TIMES:

Monday – Saturday: 10.00am – 4.00pm

ADMISSION

Free entry

Chippenham Museum
9-10 Market Place
Chippenham
Wiltshire
SN15 3HF

Tel: +44 (0)01249 705020

E-mail: heritage@chippenham.gov.uk

Chippenham Museum : Exhibitions

Hockney to Himid: 60 Years of British Printmaking

Benbecula, 1961-62
Benbecula, 1961-62
13 November – 24 April 2022

See six decades of British art through one versatile medium.

Including works by Edward Bawden, Peter Blake, Tracey Emin, Barbara Hepworth, Henry Moore, Chris Ofili, Grayson Perry, Rachel Whiteread, William Scott, amongst others, this extraordinary exhibition features over 100 prints by 90 different artists.

From wood engravings and etchings to lithographs and screenprints, printmaking enabled artists to expand their practice to explore new creative possibilities. Showcasing a wide range of artists, styles and techniques, this exhibition celebrates the extraordinary upsurge of printmaking from the 1960s to now.

Continue reading “Hockney to Himid: 60 Years of British Printmaking”