Scolar Fine Art, 35 Bruton Place, London, W1J 6NS
Peter Lanyon’s drawings constitute an important aspect of his work and yet have often been passed over and their significance neglected. In her new book devoted to this aspect of Lanyon’s oeuvre, Margaret Garlake writes:
Products of a habit as informal as day-to-day speech, they are direct, sometimes raw revelations of mind and a life. Lanyon’s drawings are, before anything else, revelations of passionate engagement and intense sensibility.
(Margaret Garlake, The Drawings of Peter Lanyon, Ashgate Publishing Ltd., London, December 2003, p.9)
Through his occasional visits to the Euston Road School in the summer of 1939, where he was tutored by the likes of William Coldstream and Victor Pasmore, Lanyon learnt the importance of drawing and precise observation as a means of developing the main body of his work.
While Lanyon remained devoted to the landscape of his native Cornwall, the exodus to St Ives during the war by artists such as Ben Nicholson and Naum Gabo had a profound impact on his art. Nicholson taught him to take a more objective view of his surroundings and gradually Lanyon learnt to depict his vision of Cornwall rather than producing a literal reproduction. His drawings acted as vital intermediaries between the actual and the echoes of the landscape to be found in his paintings.
Lanyon was stirred by his 1950 trip to Italy to renew his student interest in life drawing, a pursuit that was furthered by his move to teach at Corsham the following year. Bored by the comparative blandness of the Wiltshire countryside, he was inspired to turn to the human form by the school’s environment, which encouraged the cross pollination of ideas between artists. Even in these life works, Lanyon’s primary interest pervades; while many are literal depictions of the nude, others clearly encompass aspects of the landscape.
To coincide with the exhibition, Samuel & Co. Editions have published a new slate cut printed from one of Lanyon’s original slates in an edition of 50.
Margaret Garlake’s book, The Drawings of Peter Lanyon will be published by Ashgate Publishing Ltd. in December 2003, priced at £52.50. Please contact the gallery for further details and pre-publication prices.
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