Self-portrait in a Hat with a Basket of Vegetables
Clare 'Tony' Atwood (Richmond 1866 - Tenterden 1962)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
1951
Materials
Oil on canvas
Measurements
610 x 508 mm
Order this imageCollection
Fenton House, London
NT 1449107
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, Self-portrait by Clare Atwood (Richmond 1866 - Tenterden 1962), 1951.
Full description
Clare ‘Tony’ Atwood was born on 14 May 1866 in Richmond-upon-Thames, the daughter of an architect, Frederick Atwood, and his wife Clara Becker. She trained at the Westminster School of Art and the Slade (the Department of Fine Arts at University College London). [1] Throughout her career, Atwood exhibited most frequently at the New English Art Club, an alternative venue to the Royal Academy, which had its first show in 1886. [2] Atwood worked as a war artist during the First World War. She was commissioned by the Imperial War Museum and there are four works by her in their collection. In 1916, Edith Craig, the theatre director and Ellen Terry’s daughter, invited Atwood to live with her and the writer Christopher St John (born Christabel Marshall). Craig said, ‘If Chris does not like your being here and feels you are interfering with our friendship, out you go!’ [3] The three, described as a ménage à trois by George Bernard Shaw, lived together for the rest of their lives. Their home Smallhythe Place in Kent is now looked after by the National Trust. Atwood, who lived to be 96, is buried at Smallhythe churchyard. Atwood used the name ‘Clare’ for formal correspondence and the initial ‘C’ on paintings, including this self-portrait. However, to those closest to her, she was called ‘Tony.’ A collection of her postcards from 1929, now at Smallhythe Place, are mostly signed simply ‘T.’ Atwood painted this self-portrait in 1951, in her mid-80s. She is wearing her customary masculine attire with a hat and black jacket. The basket is full of ripe vegetables, perhaps home-grown at Smallhythe Place. Atwood had to have a hysterectomy the same year it was painted. St John wrote, ‘Thank God she got through, thanks to her splendid constitution and her calm courage.’ [4] A chalk drawing at Smallhythe Place, ‘Going to Shelter,’ (NT 1117201) may also be a self-portrait. The painting was given to the National Trust in 2006 by the actor Peter Barkworth, as part of a bequest of 55 pictures. The painting had been given to Barkworth by the opera singer Anna Pollak. Anna Pollak bequeathed two pictures by Atwood to the National Trust, which are at Smallhythe Place (NT 1118239 and NT 1118241). [1] Katharine Cockin, ‘Atwood, Clare [formerly Clara; Tony] (1866–1962), artist.’ Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004). [2] Alicia Foster, Tate Women Artists (Tate Publishing, 2003), p. 67. [3] Michael Holroyd, A Strange Eventful History (Chatto & Windus, 2008), p. 473. [4] Holroyd, p. 551. Richard Ashbourne 13/06/24
Provenance
Bequeathed by Peter Barkworth (1929 - 2006)
Credit line
Fenton House, The Peter Barkworth Collection (National Trust)
Makers and roles
Clare 'Tony' Atwood (Richmond 1866 - Tenterden 1962), artist