PAUL
NASH IN SWANAGE
The great
British landscape painter, Paul Nash (1889-1946), was
essentially an artist of place. He is associated with
Dymchurch, Avebury, the Wittenham Clumps, the Chilterns,
Iver Heath and Boar's Hill; places he painted over and over
again as he endeavoured to understand the inner reality of
the landscape. His enchantment with Swanage and the Isle of
Purbeck in Dorset is Iess well known.
He went to
live at Whitecliff Farm in Swanage in October 1934 and
remained in the town until early 1936. Soon after moving to
Whitecliff Farm he wrote 'Finding new forms: a new world
opening.' His experiments with new forms, and in particular
surrealism, in paintings such as Event on the Downs
and Landscape from a Dream, are amongst his most
successful works. Nash was drawn to the Surrealists'
explorations of the dream image, the found object and the
'power to disquiet'; he had found a modern movement that was
in tune with his personal vision.
In
February 1935 he and his wife had to leave Whitecliff Farm
and they moved to a flat at No 2 The Parade. He had been
asked to edit the Dorset Shell Guide and his research for
this took him all over the county, sketching and taking
notes. It was a remarkably creative period. In all he drew
and painted over 80 works with a Dorset theme, some of these
painted long after he had left the area.
After his
early death in 1946 his friend, Archibald Russell, wrote in
The Times , 'As a painter Paul carried on the great
tradition of Constable and Turner. High as is the esteem in
which his work is held today, I would venture to predict
that it will grow in fame.' The great success of the major
retrospective of his work at the Liverpool Tate in 2003
would seem to confirm this prediction.
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