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Lot Essay
In Notes on Ben Nicholson's development and commentary on selected works in the 1969 Tate Gallery exhibition catalogue Charles Harrison refers to the present work, 'The stone-like forms of certain of the abstract reliefs become stronger towards the late fifties, not as the reliefs of the thirties are strong, through extreme idealization and reduction, but through their identification with the textures and structures of the natural world'.
Nicholson's career flourished in the 1950s as he was promoted in a series of exhibitions mounted by the British Council in Venice and
São Paulo. His achievement was recognised by a series of awards by international juries; first prize for painting at the Carnegie's 39th International Exhibition in 1952; the Ulisse Award at the XXVII Venice Biennale in 1954; the Grand Prix at the fourth Mostra Internazionale di Banco e Nero in Lugano in 1956; First Guggenheim International painting prize for August 56 (Val d'Orcia), (Tate, London) in 1956 when it was exhibited at the award show in Paris and first prize for painting at the IV São Paulo Bienal in 1957.
Margaret Gardiner (1904-2005) was a writer, an adopter of political causes, a founder of the ICA and a notable patron of the arts. From the 1930s onwards she built up a large and significant group of pictures by artist-friends of hers including Barbara Hepworth, Naum Gabo, Terry Frost, Kenneth Armitage, Patrick Heron, Peter Lanyon, Roger Hilton, Alfred Wallis and Ben Nicholson among others. In the early days of their struggles for recognition she acquired through purchase and later as gifts from the artists. She fell in love with Orkney during a visit in the 1950s and she bought a small croft on the island of Rousay which she continued to visit well into her nineties. In 1978 she donated her by then highly valuable art collection of mainly St Ives/Cornish art to the people of Orkney in return for all the pleasure of time spent on Rousay. It is now assembled and on view to the public in two 18th Century buildings at the Pier Art Centre, Stromness, which opened in July 1979.
Gardiner explained her motivation, 'They [the artists she encontered] were sustained by a pioneering spirit, a sense of discovery, a deep belief in the importance of art in society, Art Mattered'.
Amongst the works of art that Margaret gave to the Pier Art Centre were eleven works by Ben Nicholson dating from 1929 to 1952. These are described by Patrick Heron, 'where the really indestructable kernel of this very personally assembled family of objects lies [it is] in her eleven absolutely superb Ben Nicholsons. There isn't one among them, large or small, painting or relief, abstract or figurative that isn't a little (or quite large!) masterpiece by this greatest of surviving octogenarian abstact painters the world over' (P. Heron, The Pier Art Gallery, London, 1978, p. 8). These and the important group of early works by Barbara Hepworth form the core of the collection. February 56 (granite) was retained as part of her own private collection and stayed with her in her house in Hampstead.
An exhibition to mark the 25th anniversary of the Pier Arts Centre, Works from the Pier Arts Centre Collection, Orkney is currently showing at The Dean Gallery, Edinburgh until 26 June 2005.
Nicholson's career flourished in the 1950s as he was promoted in a series of exhibitions mounted by the British Council in Venice and
São Paulo. His achievement was recognised by a series of awards by international juries; first prize for painting at the Carnegie's 39th International Exhibition in 1952; the Ulisse Award at the XXVII Venice Biennale in 1954; the Grand Prix at the fourth Mostra Internazionale di Banco e Nero in Lugano in 1956; First Guggenheim International painting prize for August 56 (Val d'Orcia), (Tate, London) in 1956 when it was exhibited at the award show in Paris and first prize for painting at the IV São Paulo Bienal in 1957.
Margaret Gardiner (1904-2005) was a writer, an adopter of political causes, a founder of the ICA and a notable patron of the arts. From the 1930s onwards she built up a large and significant group of pictures by artist-friends of hers including Barbara Hepworth, Naum Gabo, Terry Frost, Kenneth Armitage, Patrick Heron, Peter Lanyon, Roger Hilton, Alfred Wallis and Ben Nicholson among others. In the early days of their struggles for recognition she acquired through purchase and later as gifts from the artists. She fell in love with Orkney during a visit in the 1950s and she bought a small croft on the island of Rousay which she continued to visit well into her nineties. In 1978 she donated her by then highly valuable art collection of mainly St Ives/Cornish art to the people of Orkney in return for all the pleasure of time spent on Rousay. It is now assembled and on view to the public in two 18th Century buildings at the Pier Art Centre, Stromness, which opened in July 1979.
Gardiner explained her motivation, 'They [the artists she encontered] were sustained by a pioneering spirit, a sense of discovery, a deep belief in the importance of art in society, Art Mattered'.
Amongst the works of art that Margaret gave to the Pier Art Centre were eleven works by Ben Nicholson dating from 1929 to 1952. These are described by Patrick Heron, 'where the really indestructable kernel of this very personally assembled family of objects lies [it is] in her eleven absolutely superb Ben Nicholsons. There isn't one among them, large or small, painting or relief, abstract or figurative that isn't a little (or quite large!) masterpiece by this greatest of surviving octogenarian abstact painters the world over' (P. Heron, The Pier Art Gallery, London, 1978, p. 8). These and the important group of early works by Barbara Hepworth form the core of the collection. February 56 (granite) was retained as part of her own private collection and stayed with her in her house in Hampstead.
An exhibition to mark the 25th anniversary of the Pier Arts Centre, Works from the Pier Arts Centre Collection, Orkney is currently showing at The Dean Gallery, Edinburgh until 26 June 2005.