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Lot Essay
Scott turned back to painting the nude in 1954, producing distorted human forms that found a parallel in the sculpture of Scott's contemporary, Kenneth Armitage. Both artists were teaching at the Bath Academy of Art during this period and were close friends. Scott had originally registered at the Royal Academy Schools as a student of sculpture in 1931, winning a silver medal in 1933. He transferred to painting in 1934 and his interest reverts to sculptural figures in his third show at the Hanover Gallery in 1956 which included six sculptures alongside 17 paintings and 14 charcoal drawings (see N. Lynton, William Scott, London, 1990, intro.).
At this time, Alan Bowness (William Scott: Paintings, London, 1964, p. 10) detects a new influence in Scott's work, 'that of primitive and prehistoric art, always an interest of Scott's, and now a source of the directness and immediacy of feeling he was seeking. He had already said in 1954 that 'the pictures which looked most like mine were painted on walls a thousand years ago'. Holiday visits to see the cave painting of Altamira and Lascaux in 1955, and the Pompeian frescoes in 1956 strengthened this attachment with the distant past. He began to evoke through paint textures of actual walls, so that the pictures become like tablets, gouged and smeared and scratched with graffiti-like lines. The tactile and plastic qualities of primitive art have a strong appeal for Scott, as does its eroticism. In this respect his work may be compared with that of Dubuffet and Tapiès, and this seems to represent a peculiarly European feeling, which has no counterpart in mid-twentieth century American art. There is a sense of historical continuity here that cannot exist in a new country, but is inescapable in an old. The dry-stone walls near Scott's studio in Hallatrow may well have been first made in pre-historic times: their shapes and textures, even the earth itself, are reflected in Scott's pictures'.
At this time, Alan Bowness (William Scott: Paintings, London, 1964, p. 10) detects a new influence in Scott's work, 'that of primitive and prehistoric art, always an interest of Scott's, and now a source of the directness and immediacy of feeling he was seeking. He had already said in 1954 that 'the pictures which looked most like mine were painted on walls a thousand years ago'. Holiday visits to see the cave painting of Altamira and Lascaux in 1955, and the Pompeian frescoes in 1956 strengthened this attachment with the distant past. He began to evoke through paint textures of actual walls, so that the pictures become like tablets, gouged and smeared and scratched with graffiti-like lines. The tactile and plastic qualities of primitive art have a strong appeal for Scott, as does its eroticism. In this respect his work may be compared with that of Dubuffet and Tapiès, and this seems to represent a peculiarly European feeling, which has no counterpart in mid-twentieth century American art. There is a sense of historical continuity here that cannot exist in a new country, but is inescapable in an old. The dry-stone walls near Scott's studio in Hallatrow may well have been first made in pre-historic times: their shapes and textures, even the earth itself, are reflected in Scott's pictures'.