Sold
Christopher R.W. Nevinson
(1889 - 1946)
Banking at 4000 Feet, 1917
Sold
Christopher R.W. Nevinson (1889 - 1946)
Size:
Height – 40.3cm
Width – 31.6cm
This image shows the view from a plane. A hand, perhaps Nevinson’s own, grips tightly to the side. Nevinson flew in a two-seater aircraft in June 1917. This view of the earth from the air would have been a new experience for many viewers, who would have sensed the exhilaration of being inside the plane. Two weeks after Nevinson completed his drawings for these prints he was at the Front as an official war artist.
Nevinson’s prints were particularly admired when first exhibited. He contrives to make the visitor almost giddy’, one critic wrote, another that he possessed the power of expressing sensations rather than visual facts’.
Nevinson studied lithography under Ernest Jackson in 1912. At the outbreak of war he volunteered as an ambulance driver, an experience which deeply affected him. He was appointed an official war artist in 1917. These prints follow the process of building aircraft from making parts to assembly and flight. Acetylene Welder and Assembling parts both show the growing contribution of women workers.
Nevinson was born in London to the war correspondent and journalist Henry Nevinson. He studied at the Slade School and in Paris. He is one of the most renowned war artists of the period. His work was influenced by avant-garde European art movements such as Cubism and Futurism, yet slowly moved to a more realist style as he attempted to portray conflict.
This work forms part of the portfolio The Great War: Britain’s Efforts and Ideals, a series of 66 lithographic prints commissioned by the Ministry of Information in 1917. The series provide a broad and fascinating representation of Britain’s war objectives, military activities and effort on the Home Front.
We are grateful to Art Collections Online Amgueddfa Cymru — National Museum Wales for the above text.
We are grateful to Dr. Jonathan Black for the following chronology (May 2014):
Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson: Chronology:
13 August 1889: born John Street (now Keats Grove), Hampstead to Henry Woodd Nevinson (1856-1941) and Margaret Nevinson n e Jones (1858-1932).
1901: Nevinson family moved to 4 Downside Crescent, Belsize Park, London. This remained Nevinson’s home until 1919.
September 1903-December 1907: educated Uppingham Public School, Rutland.
February 1907: visited exhibition of etchings in London by Muirhead Bone and James Abbott McNeil Whistler.
1908: art student at St. John’s Wood School of Art, Elm Tree Road, London.
1909-1912: art student at the Slade School of Art, University College, Gower Street, London.
May 1909: visited exhibition of etchings in London by Francis Dodd.
May 1911: visited Professor Michael Sadler to see his collection of German Expressionist woodcuts.
1911-1912: received instruction in lithography from Ernest Jackson, London County Council School, Southampton Row, London.
April 1913: first meeting with a Futurist artist ‘ Gino Severini.
October 1913: exhibited Futurist paintings at the âPost-Impressionists and Futurists’ exhibition, Dor Galleries, New Bond Street, London.
November 1913: founder member of the London Group.
June 1914: publication in London of the English Futurist Manifesto (with F.T. Marinetti) âVital English Art.’
November 1914-January 1915: service as an ambulance driver and medical orderly with the Friends Ambulance Unit in France and Belgium.
June 1915-January 1916: service as a private in the Royal Army Medical Corps at the Third London General Hospital (Territorial), Wandsworth.
June 1915: exhibited as an âIndependent’ in the Vorticist Exhibition, Dor Galleries, London.
November 1915: married Kathleen Mary Knowlman at Hampstead Town Hall.
Summer 1916: made first prints (drypoints).
26 September-4 November 1916: first solo exhibition held at the Leicester Galleries, Leicester Square, London (included 12 prints ‘ all drypoints).
January 1917: first lithographs exhibited at Senefelder Club, Leicester Galleries, London.
June 1917: contributed six lithographs on theme of âMaking Aircraft’ to Britain’s Efforts and Ideals lithographic series commissioned by the Department of Information.
July-August 1917: one month in France and Belgium as an official war artist for the Department of Information.
January-February 1918: made first woodcuts.
1 March-5 April 1918: exhibition of his official war art held at the Leicester Galleries, London (included 19 prints: 11 lithographs; 6 drypoints and 2 woodcuts).
Summer 1918: made first mezzotints.
January 1919: renounced adherence to Futurism.
29 April-17 May 1919: exhibition of 46 prints at the Frederick J. Keppel Galleries, 4 East 39th Street, New York (21 lithographs; 20 drypoints; 3 mezzotints and 2 woodcuts).
May 1919: first visit to New York.
June 1919: death of only son Anthony Christopher Wynne Nevinson in London.
June 1919: moved to Flat 1, 295 Euston Road, London.
October 1919: solo exhibition at the Leicester Galleries, London (included 10 prints: 4 mezzotints; 3 lithographs; 2 drypoints and 1 woodcut).
July-August 1920: solo exhibition at the Manchester City Art Gallery (included 26 prints: 15 lithographs; 8 drypoints and 3 mezzotints).
October-November 1920: Nevinson and wife visited New York.
8 November-4 December 1920: solo exhibition âThe Old World and The New’ at the Bourgeois Galleries, Fifth Avenue and 53rd Street, New York (included 31prints: 18 lithographs; 11 drypoints and 2 mezzotints).
April 1921: 10 New York prints exhibited at Friday Club, London.
July 1921: 12 New York prints exhibited at the Keppel Galleries, New York.
August 1921: moved to Number One, Steele’s Studios, Haverstock Hill, London.
February 1922: made first etchings and aquatints.
February 1923: solo exhibition of 47 drypoints and etchings at the Leicester Galleries, London.
April 1924: 20 of his prints displayed inside the British Pavilion at the 19th Venice Biennale.
January 1926: exhibited 40 drypoints and etchings with Walter Sickert in exhibition âTwo British Etchers’ at the Albert Roulier Galleries, South Michigan Avenue, Chicago, USA.
October 1926: solo exhibition of prints at the Kraushaar Galleries, Fifth Avenue, New York.
January 1927: solo exhibition of prints at Alex Reid and Lefevre Gallery, Glasgow.
January 1927: elected a member of the Savage Club, London.
25 April-21 May 1927: solo exhibition of 56 prints at Alex Reid and Lefevre Gallery, Cork Street, London (26 drypoints; 22 etchings; 4 etchings with aquatint and 4 mezzotints).
July-August 1927: solo exhibition of prints at the Ruskin Galleries, Birmingham.
May 1929: elected a member of the New English Art Club, London.
January 1930: elected Vice-Chairman of the National Society.
October 1930: solo exhibition at the Leicester Galleries, London (included 38 prints: 16 etchings; 11 drypoints; 9 lithographs and 2 mezzotints ‘ this would be his last major public display of prints).
April 1931: joint exhibition with sculptor Barney Seale at J. Leger & Son Gallery, Fifth Avenue, New York.
November 1931: 6 of his prints included in the British Art Exhibition, Tokyo, Japan.
1932-1933: prolonged period of serious illness; nearly died in summer of 1932.
February 1932: elected a member of the Royal Society of British Artists.
May 1932: publication of a volume of Modern Masters of Etching: C.R.W. Nevinson by Malcom Salaman.
June 1932: death of Margaret Nevinson.
October 1934: published Exodus AD: A Warning to Civilians with Princess Princess Troubetzkoy (Muriel Beddam).
November 1937: published autobiography Paint and Prejudice.
May 1938: appointed a Chevalier of the Legion d’Honneur by the French Government.
April 1939: elected an Associate of the Royal Academy, London (proposed by etchers Francis Dodd and Henry Rushbury).
September 1940: volunteered to work as medical orderly and stretcher bearer at the Royal Free Hospital, Hampstead.
November 1940: suffered a mild stroke while tending wounded at the Royal Free Hospital.
1941-1942: unofficial war artist attached to RAF Bomber Command.
November 1941: death of Henry Nevinson.
October 1942: suffered second more serious stroke, lost use of right hand and lost sight in right eye.
7 October 1946: died at home, no 1 Steele’s Studios, Chalk Farm.
May-June 1947: C.R.W. Nevinson Memorial Exhibition held at the Leicester Galleries, London.
10 September-30 October 1988: C.R.W. Nevinson: A Retrospective Exhibition, Kettle’s Yard Gallery, University of Cambridge.
28 October 1999-30 January 2000: Retrospective Exhibition C.R.W. Nevinson: The Twentieth Century, Imperial War Museum, London.
25 September-25 October 2014: Retrospective Exhibition of his prints C.R.W. Nevinson: A Printmaker in War and Peace, Osborne Samuel Gallery, London.
