Gwen John (1876-1939)
Augustus Edwin John, RA (Tenby 1878 – Fordingbridge, Hampshire 1961)
Category
Art / Drawings and watercolours
Date
1890 - 1899
Materials
Ink and wash on paper
Measurements
290 x 200 mm
Place of origin
Great Britain
Order this imageCollection
Mottisfont, Hampshire
NT 769753
Caption
Originally from Fordingbridge, Augustus John was a larger than life character. He exhibited with the London Group during World War II, when they were showing in Burlington House (home to the Royal Academy). This simple but effective drawing captures the artist’s sister as she stands with her back to him. With a few deft lines, Augustus John has marked out a silhouette that is familiar to him, adding detail sparingly: the knot of hair at her nape is a rare moment of complexity. Although they had very different personalities, the outgoing Augustus said of his more introverted sister that they were ‘the same thing, really’. Here, he has pictured Gwen with a sensitivity to the subjects that she depicted in her own work, meditative studies of solitary figures absorbed in their own thoughts.
Summary
Ink and wash drawing on paper, Gwen John (1876-1939) by Augustus John RA (Tenby 1879 – Fordingbridge, Hampshire 1961), ca 1890-99
Provenance
Presented by Derek Hill (1916 - 2000) through The National Art Collections Fund (Art Fund) in 1996
Credit line
Mottisfont Abbey,The Derek Hill Collection (presented to the National Trust through the National Art-Collections Fund in 1996)
Makers and roles
Augustus Edwin John, RA (Tenby 1878 – Fordingbridge, Hampshire 1961), artist
References
Conroy, Rachel, Women Artists and Designers at the National Trust, 2025, p. 168