SOLDInscribed on the reverse: W. M. Knights, 22 Madeira Road, Streatham.
Pencil on paper, squared, 24 5/8 x 18 ins. (62.5 x 45.7 cm.)
Tags: Winifred Knights pencil farms/domestic animals work WOMEN
Provenance: the artist's estate
Literature: Paul Liss, Winifred Knights, The Fine Art Society, 1995, no. 2a, pp. 31 and 48; Llewellyn, Sacha, Winifred Knights, Lund Humphries 2016
Exhibited: Winifred Knights, The Fine Art Society, 1995; no. 12 d; London, The Fine Art Society, Winifred Knights, 1995, no. 2a
This
study is for the earliest of Knights' decorative paintings: Design for
Wall Decoration, the Slade Sketch Club Special Figure Subject for
January 1918. Knights painted an oil of the Design for Wall Decoration
(see below), but the mural itself is unlikely to have been executed -
other studies indicate that its intended size was to be 5 x 6 ft (the
size of paintings entered for the Scholarship to Rome). The picture is
inspired by the Italian Primitives, as the clarity of form, and the
thoughtful arrangement of the figures in space indicate. The studies for
the composition were probably executed while staying at Lineholt Farm
in Worcestershire, between October 1917 and October 1918.
