C. R. W. Nevinson
C. R. W. Nevinson Slade School of Art |
---|
Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson
Nevinson studied at the
At the outbreak of World War I, Nevinson joined the Friends' Ambulance Unit and was deeply disturbed by his work tending wounded French and British soldiers. For a very brief period he served as a volunteer ambulance driver before ill health forced his return to Britain. Subsequently, Nevinson volunteered for home service with the Royal Army Medical Corps. He used these experiences as the subject matter for a series of powerful paintings which used the machine aesthetic of Futurism and the influence of Cubism to great effect. His fellow artist Walter Sickert wrote at the time that Nevinson's painting La Mitrailleuse, 'will probably remain the most authoritative and concentrated utterance on the war in the history of painting.' In 1917, Nevinson was appointed an official war artist, but he was no longer finding Modernist styles adequate for describing the horrors of modern war, and he increasingly painted in a more realistic manner.[1] Nevinson's later World War One paintings, based on short visits to the Western Front, lacked the same powerful effect as those earlier works which had helped to make him one of the most famous young artists working in England.
Shortly after the end of the war, Nevinson travelled to the United States of America, where he painted a number of powerful images of New York. However, his boasting and exaggerated claims of his war experiences, together with his depressive and temperamental personality, made him many enemies in both the US and Britain. In 1920, the critic
Biography
Early life
Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson was born in
After leaving the Slade, Nevinson studied at the
World War One
Medical orderly
At the outbreak of
Nevinson had four pictures included in the Second Exhibition of the London Group held in March 1915. Nevinson's Futurist painting, Returning to the Trenches, and the sculpture
1916
Nevinson used his experiences in France and at the London General Hospital as the subject matter for a series of powerful paintings which used Futurist and Cubist techniques, as well as more realistic depictions, to great effect. In March 1916 he exhibited his painting La Mitrailleuse with the Allied Artists Association at the Grafton Galleries. The artist Walter Sickert wrote at the time that La Mitrailleuse 'will probably remain the most authoritative and concentrated utterance on the war in the history of painting.'[14]
The reaction to La Mitrailleuse prompted the
Official war artist
In April 1917, with the support of Muirhead Bone and his own father, Nevinson was appointed an official war artist by the Department of Information. Wearing the uniform of a war correspondent, he visited the Western Front from 5 July to 4 August 1917, a period which included the start of the Battle of Passchendaele on 31 July. Nevinson was billeted with other visitors in the Château d'Harcourt, south of Caen.[6] Although life at the Chateau allowed Nevinson to demonstrate his cocktail making skills to the other visitors,[17] he soon transferred to the 4th Infantry Division near Arras. From there he moved widely along the Front, visiting forward observation posts and artillery batteries. He flew with the Royal Flying Corps and came under anti-aircraft fire. He spent a night in an observation balloon above the Somme. Making his way to a forward post one day he was pinned down by enemy fire for an hour. An unauthorised visit to the Ypres Salient earned Nevinson a reprimand and added to his reputation for recklessness.[3]
When he returned to London in August 1917, Nevinson first completed six lithographs on the subject of Building Aircraft for the
Not only did the Department of Information art advisors consider these new works dull, but the War Office censors also objected to three of the paintings. Nevinson was quite happy to reverse the direction of traffic in the painting The Road from Arras to Bapaume but was not prepared to compromise over the other two paintings. The censor objected to A Group of Soldiers on the grounds that "the type of man represented is not worthy of the British Army". Amid the sarcasm and vitriol of Nevinson's response, he did make the point that the soldiers in the painting were sketched from a group home on leave from the Front that he had encountered on the London Underground. The canvas was eventually passed for display.[3] Not so Paths of Glory, Nevinson's painting of two fallen British soldiers in a field of mud and barbed wire. Told at the beginning of 1918 that the painting would not be passed for exhibition Nevinson insisted on displaying it with a brown strip of paper across it, with the word 'Censored' scrawled on it. This earned Nevinson a reprimand not just for displaying the painting but using the word 'Censored' without authorisation.[20][21][22]
Hall of Remembrance Commission
In 1918, after some negotiation, Nevinson agreed to work for the British War Memorials Committee to produce a single large artwork for a proposed, but never built, Hall of Remembrance. He was offered an honorary commission as a Second Lieutenant but refused, fearing it would prejudice his medical exemption from combat duties. A short visit over a long weekend to the Western Front was arranged but without a commission Nevinson had to be accompanied wherever he went and his movements were restricted. Nevinson quickly fell out with the Army minder assigned to him in France, and claimed he was refused permission to visit the casualty stations he wanted to sketch in.[6]
While on the trip, he did sketch a line of walking wounded, and some prisoners making their way to the rear from an early morning offensive.[23] This became the basis of the painting The Harvest of Battle which was the largest single work Nevinson painted. It was completed in February 1919 and Nevinson arranged a 'private view' of the painting in his studio on 2 April for numerous critics and journalists. Whilst this produced some favourable reviews, notably in the Daily Express, it also led to articles claiming that the painting was so grim that it was being withheld from the public.[6][10] When the painting was shown at the huge The Nation's War Paintings and Drawings exhibition organised by the Imperial War Museum in December 1919 at Burlington House Nevinson was furious to find it had not been hung in the main room but rather in a side gallery.[24] He began a campaign of vilification against all those he held responsible for this insult. Unreasonable as Nevinsons' outrage was it did have consequences; it destroyed his friendship with Muirhead Bone, who had been on the organising committee for the exhibition, made the Imperial War Museum wary of dealing with him, and blinded Nevinson himself to the high esteem in which his war paintings were held.[6]
Post-war career
Nevinson, alongside
Nevinson's boasting and exaggerated claims concerning his war experiences, together with his depressive and temperamental personality, made him many enemies in both the US and Britain.
Throughout the 1930s Nevinson painted a number of cityscapes in London, Paris and New York which were generally well received. The most notable of these is The Strand by Night from 1937.
World War Two
At the start of World War Two the British Government created the War Artists' Advisory Committee, WAAC, and appointed Kenneth Clark as its chairman.[34] Despite the public hostility between Clark and himself, Nevinson was disappointed not to be offered a commission by WAAC. He submitted three paintings to WAAC in December 1940 which were also rejected.[35] He worked as a stretcher-bearer in London throughout The Blitz, during which his own studio and the family home in Hampstead were hit by bombs.[2] WAAC eventually purchased two pictures from him, Anti-aircraft Defences and a depiction of a fire-bomb attack, The Fire of London, December 29th – An Historic Record.[6]
Nevinson obtained a commission from the
Bibliography
- 1918 Nevinson, C.R.W. and Flitch, J.E. Crawford, The Great War: Fourth Year. London. Grant Richards Limited.
- 1917 Nevinson, C.R.W. and Konody, Paul G., Modern War Paintings. London. Grant Richards Limited.
- 1938 Nevinson, C.R.W., Paint and Prejudice. New York. Harcourt Brace and Company.
References
- ISBN 978-1-904897-98-9.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-905847-84-6.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-906593-00-1.
- doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/35206. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ^ "Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson". British Museum. Retrieved 31 August 2023.
- ^ ISBN 0-7181-2314-X.
- ISBN 0-19-860476-9.
- ^ a b c Government Art Collection. "CRW Nevinson in London". Government Art Collection. Archived from the original on 6 October 2014. Retrieved 17 September 2014.
- JSTOR 777256.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-4411-3058-7.
- ^ ISBN 0-300-09507-4.
- ^ "Oil Painting - LaPatrie". Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery. Retrieved 8 February 2017.
- ^ Tate. "Catalogue entry, Study for Returning to the Trenches". Tate. Retrieved 25 September 2014.
- ^ Tate. "Catalogue entry, La Mitraillense". Tate. Retrieved 22 September 2014.
- ^ Michael Glover (3 November 1999). "Arts: A man who did well out of the war". The Independent. Retrieved 29 September 2014.
- ^ Roger Tolson (July 2006). "Wars and Conflict;Taube". BBC History. Retrieved 17 September 2014.
- ^ Felten, Eric (6 October 2007). "St. Louis – Party Central". The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones & Company. p. W4. Retrieved 6 October 2007.
- ISBN 978-0-7200-0627-8.
- ^ Imperial War Museum. "First World War Art Archive, CRW Nevinson (Part 1)". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 27 September 2014.
- ^ Allan Little (23 June 2014). "The faceless men". BBC News. Retrieved 23 June 2014.
- ^ Richard Slocombe (30 May 2014). "CRW Nevinson Painting: Paths of Glory". The Telegraph. Archived from the original on 22 August 2014. Retrieved 17 September 2014.
- ^ Imperial War Museum. "Paths of Glory". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 19 September 2014.
- ^ Imperial War Museum. "The Harvest of Battle". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 23 September 2014.
- ^ Imperial War Museum. "First World War Art Archive, CRW Nevinson (Part 2)". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 27 September 2014.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-7188-3090-8.
- ^ Felicity MacKenzie (29 April 2019). "Looking for solace: C.R.W. Nevinson and Futurism". Art UK. Retrieved 28 May 2020.
- ^ a b Toby Treves (May 2000). "The Soul of the Soulless City (New York-an abstraction) 1920". Tate. Retrieved 19 September 2014.
- ^ "Looking Down into Wall Street". British Museum. Retrieved 21 March 2017.
- ISBN 978-0-87413-942-6.
- ISBN 978-1-84403-563-2.
- ^ Lucy Ellis (10 April 2020). "Luxury assortment: the British artists behind Cadbury's chocolate boxes". Art UK. Retrieved 22 July 2022.
- ISBN 978-0-300-10890-3.
- ^ Royal Academy. "CRW Nevinson, ARA". Royal Academy of Arts. Retrieved 25 September 2016.
- ^ Imperial War Museum. "War artists archive, CRW Nevinson". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 27 September 2014.
- ^ Imperial War Museum. "Anti-aircraft Defences". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 19 September 2014.
- ^ Government Art Collection. "Battlefields of Britain". Government Art Collection. Archived from the original on 13 June 2018. Retrieved 23 September 2014.
Further reading
- Black, J. (2014). C.R.W. Nevinson: The Complete Prints. Farnham, Surrey. Lund Humphries. ISBN 978-1-84822-157-4.
External links
- 108 artworks by or after C. R. W. Nevinson at the Art UK site
- Works by Nevinson in the Imperial War Museum collection.
- Works by Nevinson in The Royal Air Force Museum London collection.
- Works in the UK Government Art Collection