AIRCRAFT TRACE I, 1964
Enamel on board. 15¾ x 11¾in. (40.4 x 30.3cm.)
Signed with the monogram and dated lower right.
Inscribed on the reverse with the artists’ name and title.
Provenance
National Trust bequest.
This paintint marks the first dated appearance of enamel paint in Colquhoun’s work. Writing in the catalogue for the 1976 Newlyn retrospective, she wrote: “From the middle 1960’s I have used enamel paint, more or less diluted, in a semi automatic way to bring about the emergence of what Breton called the ‘Convulsive Landscape’.”
The image brings to mind the short story Nature Note (1942) in which Colquhoun likened aircraft to butterflies: “On their love flights they soar and plunge through the air, leaving a dual trace spun from cloud, which forms magnificent simple arabesques in space: they execute at once a drawing, an evanescent sculpture and a dance.”
References
Colquhoun, I. Nature Note. in Bayliss, B., Moore, N. and Newton, D. eds.) The Fortune Anthology, The Fortune Press, London 1942 p29.
Colquhoun, I. 1976. Catalogue introduction: Ithell Colquhoun: Surrealism, Paintings, Drawings, Collages 1936-76. Newlyn, Newlyn Art Gallery.