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Lot Essay
We are very grateful to Richard Shone for his assistance in preparing this catalogue entry.
Study for Berwick was painted in preparation for the murals of Berwick Church, a remarkable series of painting completed in 1943 by Vanessa Bell, Duncan Grant and her children Quentin and Angelica for a 12th Century church, located just three miles from their home at Charleston in Sussex.
The commission to decorate the church came from the Bishop Bell of Chichester who hoped to revive a tradition of wall painting in Sussex churches. He was in contact with Charles H. Reilly, an architectural scholar and friend of Duncan Grant’s aunt, who suggested Grant as an experienced mural painter. Grant soon involved Vanessa Bell alongside Quentin and Angelica and in a letter to Jane Bussey in 1941 Bell describes the commission with great excitement. Over the intervening years she conceived two murals, Annunciation on the nave of the south wall, and The Nativity on the North wall. Throughout the church, Bell and Grant’s admiration for Piero della Francesca and Italian painting is evident, recalling their own travels to Italy while remaining distinct to wartime Sussex. In her biography of Bell, Frances Spalding emphasizes the importance of this commission for Bell in the wake of two personal tragedies, the death of her son Julian in 1937 and sister, the writer Virginia Woolf in 1941; the religious scenes offered a framework for poignant reflections on her own grief and loss.
The present work is a study for a bouquet of Madonna lilies at the centre of Annunciation. In the study three stems of white flowers burst out against a backdrop of a draped fabric. The composition is realised with a characteristic energy, painted in rapid brushstrokes with lively mark-making. The painting has the distinctive warmth of Bell’s palette paired with a subtle luminosity that continues in both her murals. Frances Spalding describes the lilies as they appear in Berwick church between the curve of two arches: ‘within this thin wedge rises a vase of madonna lilies, their blooms carefully composed into an arching design. Lit from behind and edged with light, they, in Auden’s phrase, ‘show an affirming flame’ ’ (F. Spalding, Vanessa Bell, London 1983, p. 321).
Study for Berwick was painted in preparation for the murals of Berwick Church, a remarkable series of painting completed in 1943 by Vanessa Bell, Duncan Grant and her children Quentin and Angelica for a 12th Century church, located just three miles from their home at Charleston in Sussex.
The commission to decorate the church came from the Bishop Bell of Chichester who hoped to revive a tradition of wall painting in Sussex churches. He was in contact with Charles H. Reilly, an architectural scholar and friend of Duncan Grant’s aunt, who suggested Grant as an experienced mural painter. Grant soon involved Vanessa Bell alongside Quentin and Angelica and in a letter to Jane Bussey in 1941 Bell describes the commission with great excitement. Over the intervening years she conceived two murals, Annunciation on the nave of the south wall, and The Nativity on the North wall. Throughout the church, Bell and Grant’s admiration for Piero della Francesca and Italian painting is evident, recalling their own travels to Italy while remaining distinct to wartime Sussex. In her biography of Bell, Frances Spalding emphasizes the importance of this commission for Bell in the wake of two personal tragedies, the death of her son Julian in 1937 and sister, the writer Virginia Woolf in 1941; the religious scenes offered a framework for poignant reflections on her own grief and loss.
The present work is a study for a bouquet of Madonna lilies at the centre of Annunciation. In the study three stems of white flowers burst out against a backdrop of a draped fabric. The composition is realised with a characteristic energy, painted in rapid brushstrokes with lively mark-making. The painting has the distinctive warmth of Bell’s palette paired with a subtle luminosity that continues in both her murals. Frances Spalding describes the lilies as they appear in Berwick church between the curve of two arches: ‘within this thin wedge rises a vase of madonna lilies, their blooms carefully composed into an arching design. Lit from behind and edged with light, they, in Auden’s phrase, ‘show an affirming flame’ ’ (F. Spalding, Vanessa Bell, London 1983, p. 321).