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Stephen Bone
(1904 - 1958)
Gavin in his study at St John’s, early 1920s
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Stephen Bone (1904 - 1958)
Size:
Height – 47cm
Width – 60cm
Gavin Bone was an undergraduate at St John’s College, Oxford, matriculating in 1925 and graduating with First Class Honours in 1928. Shortly after, Bone was elected a Fellow of the College in 1931 and began to lecture for the University and tutor St John’s undergraduates (most famously these included Philip Larkin and Kingsley Amis) until his premature death from chronic illness on 8 April 1942, aged 34. From records of his academic engagement during his lifetime (such as his publications, essays and lecture notes), Bone’s specialism was later Medieval and Early Modern verse. Yet, after his death there were published two volumes of Old English poetic translations: Anglo-Saxon Poetry (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1943) and Beowulf (Oxford: Blackwell, 1945). Bone had published some of his translations in his lifetime, but it is clear that in the final years of his life he was passionately occupied with transforming poetry from previous millennium into bold and willful contempo- rary poems. His Beowulf is accompanied by striking illustrations of key events from the epic poem’s narrative, and these attest to Bone’s own talent as a visual artist among a family of professional draughtsmen and painters and his lifelong relationship to the arts. The present oil painting shows Bone, aged between 18 and 20, in his undergraduate rooms at St John’s, surrounded by indicators of his great loves: multiple bookcases packed with a great many volumes; and walls abundant in framed illustrations. Two maps feature among them: to the right is a map of the British Isles, li- kely to remind him of his much-loved Scottish family heritage, and more central is a map of Spain, where he and his family often tra- velled. A flute is laid out on the table, which Bone was known to play. The picture above the fireplace appears to show a bouquet of flowers, and a vase of flowers appears on the mantle next to it. Or- chids were another lifelong interest of Bone’s, and his illustrations of orchids (completed by his father and brother) would be pos- thumously published as The Wild Orchids of Great Britain in 1950 alongside commentary from his childhood friend and novelist Jo- celyn Brooke. This intricately detailed setting of Gavin Bone thus encapsulates many of the prominent aspects of Bone’s tragically short but vibrant and fruitful life.
Stephen Bone (13 November 1904 – 15 September 1958), was an English artist, writer, broadcaster and noted war artist. Bone achieved early success in book illustration using woodcuts before he turned to painting and art criticism.
Born in Chiswick, London and was the son of Sir Muirhead Bone and of Gertrude Helana Dodd, a writer. After leaving Bedales School he travelled widely in Europe with his father before enrolling at the Slade School of Fine Art in 1922. He became disillusioned with the Slade and left in 1924 to begin illustrating books, with woodcuts, for his mother and other writers. In 1925 Bone was awarded the Gold Medal for Wood Engraving at the International Exhibition in Paris. In 1926 he was the subject of a joint exhibition at the Goupil Gallery, alongside Rodney Joseph Burn, and in 1928 he painted a mural for the underground station at Piccadilly Circus.
In 1929 he married the artist Mary Adshead and they were to have two sons and a daughter. The couple travelled extensively across Britain and Europe which allowed Bone to paint outdoors in all weathers and develop a style of bright landscape painting that proved popular and sold well at a number of gallery exhibitions.
At the outbreak of the Second World War, Stephen Bone enlisted as an officier in the Civil Defence Camouflage Establishment based in Leamington Spa. In June 1943 Bone was appointed by the War Artists’ Advisory Committee to be a full-time salaried artist to the Ministry of Information specialising in Admiralty subjects. The post had originally being held by Stephens father, Muirhead Bone, but following the death of Gavin Bone, Stephens brother, Muirhead decided not to continue with the commission. Stephen produced a large quantity of works showing naval craft and coastal installations around Great Britain. He recorded the 1944 Normandy landings, painted scenes in Caen and Courseulles after the invasion and went on to record the assault on Walcheren Island in the Netherlands. Towards the end of 1944 he travelled to Norway and painted the wreck of the Tirpitz.
After the War, Bone found his style of painting somewhat out of fashion and, although he continued to paint, he found it difficult to get his work exhibited. He became an art critic for the Manchester Guardian, wrote humorous pieces for the Glasgow Herald and did television and radio work for the BBC. With his wife, he wrote and illustrated children’s books. He died of cancer on 15 September 1958 at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London.
