L'ANCRE, 1939
Oil on canvas. 22 x 22in. (55.9 x 55.9cm.)
Signed and dated. Inscribed on the reverse.
Provenance
Sotheby’s, London, 10th June 1981.
Exhibited
London, Mayor Gallery, 1939, No 5.
Northampton, Northampton Gallery, 1939.
Oxford, The Ashmolean Museum, 1939.
London, The Leicester Galleries, 1940.
Harrogate, Harrogate Gallery, 1941, No. 22.
London, Hamet Gallery, 1971, No. 30.
London, Leva Gallery, 1974, No. 13.
Penzance, Newlyn Orion Gallery, 1976, No. 8.
London, Parkin Gallery, 1977, No. 20.
This is an industrial artefact that is difficult to identify, lying on a disc that is has organic and inorganic elements. It has been suggested that the artefact is an anchor, which would fit in with the nautical theme of the Méditerranée series, but there must be uncertainty about this (where, for example, is the cable attachment? Additionally, the ‘barbed’ projections would not act as flukes. It could as easily be a snapfastner.
The work is square. The lower corner of the socket lies at the golden section of the vertical and horizontal dimension and also on the diagonal that runs from lower left to upper right.
One of the Méditerranée series
Literature
See Chadwick, W. Women Artists and the Surrealist Movement, Thames and Hudson, London 1985, p153.