Private
Collection
Collection
Ian Grant
(1904 - 1993)
Figures by a Lake, circa 1928
Private Collection
Ian Grant (1904 - 1993)
Size:
Height – 119.4cm
Width – 211cm
Provenance: the British School at Rome; Christie’s, 14 October 1987; Anthony Mould Ltd; private collection since 1992
Exhibited: The Last Romantics, Barbican Art Gallery, London, 1989 (no. 483)
Literature:
John Christian, The Last Romantics, exh. cat., Barbican Art Gallery,
London, 1989, repr. p. 197; Peter Davis, A Northern School, Bristol
1989, p. 170
Painted in his Diploma year at the RCA, and
arguably the artist’s most significant early work, Figures by a Lake is
a fusion of everything that influenced Grant during his formative
years: the work of Maurice William Greiffenhagen, who taught him at the
Glasgow School of Art from 1922 to 1926, the influence of William
Rothenstein and Thomas Monnington, under whom he studied at the Royal
College of Art from 1927 to 1930, and most notably the influence of
Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, whose work Grant became acquainted with
while studying in Paris during the summers of 1925 and 1926.This
painting was Grant’s entry for the 1929 Scholarship to the British
School at Rome, for which he received second prize. Of his education at
the Royal College, Grant recalled:The great high priest of drawing was
Ingres and you were told to study Piero della Francesca as a Painter’
(quoted by Peter Davis, A Northern School, Bristol 1989, p. 170).
Painter, art historian and teacher, born in Scotland. He studied at Glasgow School of Art, 1922-6, under Maurice Greiffenhagen, then in 1927 at Atelier Colarossi, Paris, and Royal College of Art, 1927-30. Grant became senior lecturer at Manchester Regional College of Art, staying there, 1937-69; his wife Margaret Gumuchian, whom he married in 1953, was a student in his class. Other appointments included part-time work at Mauldeth Road College of Further Education, 1959-79, and lecturing in art history at Manchester University extra¬mural department. Grant was for a time vice-president of MAFA, where he won a major prize in 1986. In 1989 he was included in The Last Romantics at Barbican Art Gallery. Manchester City Art Gallery holds his work, which was exhibited at solo shows at Salford Art Gallery and elsewhere in the north. Lived in Stockport, Cheshire.