A Study of Winifred Knights, 1915-1933
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A Study of Winifred Knights, 1915-1933 Rosanna Eckersley Department of Art History and World Art Studies University of East Anglia A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy November 2015 © This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with the author and that use of any formation derived there from must be in accordance with current UK Copyright Law. In addition, any quotation or extract must include full attribution. Abstract Winifred Knights, 1899-1947, was a student at the Slade School of Art from 1915, where she developed a decorative manner of rhythmic, repetitive forms, one form of cautious modernism. In 1920 she was the first woman to win the Rome Prize in Decorative Painting. The award was for three years at the British School at Rome. Knights often chose to base her paintings on biblical subjects, or the lives of saints. She was not religious and I argue that these stories, which were well-known in Britain at the time, were vehicles to represent the lives of women and families in the unsettled years during and after WWI. Many women artists have depicted domestic scenes, but Knights chose the exterior and multi-figure compositions, including many self-portraits. She used these compositions to explore women‟s vulnerability, rebellion against male control, maternity and the self-sufficiency of a women‟s community. Personal material is present in all her work and much of it deals with the traumas she suffered. My thesis argues that her paintings‟ engagement with the viewer is not restricted by this material: the themes she explored resonated with contemporaneous viewers, as they do today. The argument closely examines Winifred Knights‟ paintings, including their art historical sources. It draws on her correspondence and on the social conditions of Britain and Italy. The small number of her oil paintings is no measure of Knights‟ success as artist and woman. Indeed, the many dimensions of life as artist, woman, mother and wife were important to Knights. While previous studies of women artists have regarded biography as artistic source material or distraction, I argue that it is central to understanding Knights and her contexts. This thesis therefore argues that the many aspects of a complete life fed into Knights‟ painting and can be seen in her sensitive depictions of women‟s lives. 2 List of Contents Abstract 02 List of Contents 03 List of Illustrations 04 Acknowledgements 11 Introduction 12 Chapter One. Women, girls and virginity in Winifred Knights‟ early work 36 Fairies and goblins and girls: Knights‟ watercolours c.1913-1917 36 Images of Modern Life and the Summer Composition Prize, 1918-1920 65 Chapter Two. The Deluge 81 Chapter Three. Winifred Knights and Italy in the 1920s: gender and conservatism 123 Italian Landscape (1921, Tate Collection) 124 Bathsheba (c.1922, private collection); Figures in a Boat, Lake Piediluco (1924-1930, 136 private collection); and Santissima Trinita (1924-1930, private collection) The Marriage at Cana (c.1923, Te Papa Museum) 150 Chapter Four. Iconography and meaning in Scenes from the Life of St Martin of Tours, Canterbury Cathedral 169 Conclusion 211 Bibliography 217 Illustrations 243 3 Illustrations Plate 1: Winifred Knights (to the right) next to Colin Gill, British School at Rome, 1921, photograph. University College London, Special Collections (hereafter known as UCL Special Collections). Plate 2: Winifred Knights with her son John Monnington, undated photograph. Private collection. Plate 3: Letter from Winifred Knights to her aunt, 6th June 1917, illustrated with self-portrait in pen and watercolour. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 4: Winifred Knights: woman in heavily patterned dress, c.1914-1915, pen and ink and pencil on paper. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 5: Edward Burne-Jones: Clara von Bork 1560, 1850, watercolour and gouache on paper, 34.2 x 17.9 cm. Tate Collection. Photograph © Tate, 2015. Plate 6: Winifred Knights: woman in an oriental setting, c.1914-1915, watercolour and pen and ink on paper. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 7: Winifred Knights: drawing of a fairy, c.1914-1915, pencil and pen and ink on paper. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 8: Winifred Knights: illustration to „Goblin Market‟ by Christina Rossetti, c.1915, pen and ink on paper, 17.4 x 17.4 cm, tondo. University College London Art Museum (hereafter known as UCL Art Museum). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 9: Winifred Knights: Rapunzel, c.1915, pen, ink and pencil on paper. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 10: Winifred Knights: The Wise and Foolish Virgins, 1915, watercolour on paper, 30.0 x 12.05 cm. James Allen‟s Girls‟ School. Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 11: Winifred Knights: Illustration to Christina Rossetti‟s „Goblin Market‟, c.1913-1914, watercolour on paper. UCL Art Museum. Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 12: Winifred Knights: illustration to Christina Rossetti‟s „Goblin Market‟ showing a girl turning back towards the goblins, c.1913-1915, watercolour on paper. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 13: Winifred Knights: illustration to Christina Rossetti‟s „Goblin Market‟ showing a procession of goblins, in landscape format, c.1913-1915, watercolour on paper. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 14: Winifred Knights: Illustration for the Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti, 1913, watercolour on paper, 44.0 x 58.0 cm. UCL Art Museum. Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 15: Dante Gabriel Rossetti: frontispiece and title page to Christina Rossetti, Goblin Market and Other Poems, London and Cambridge, Macmillan and Co.1862. Image source: British Library, no known copyright restrictions. Plate 16: Laurence Housman, illustration to Christina Rossetti: „Goblin Market‟, London: Macmillan and Co. 1893, illustration facing p 2. Illustration freely available for scholarly purposes through Armstrong Browning Library, 19c Women Poets, digital collections, Baylor University, Waco, Texas. Plate 17: Margaret Agnes Rope: Goblin Market, c.1905, stained glass panel. Private collection. 4 Plate 18: Derwent Lees: Self-portrait, c.1917, etching on paper. National Portrait Gallery. Image supplied through National Portrait Gallery Creative Commons Licence. Plate 19: Gabriel Scorodumoff, Susanna and the Elders, 1779, coloured print on paper, 25.3 x 19.0 cm, after Guido Reni: Susanna and the Elders, 1620-1625. British Museum. Copyright British Museum, approved for use for purposes exclusively non-commercial and scholarly, with URL: http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/search.aspx?searchText=Susa nna+and+the+Elders&page=2 British Museum. Plate 20: Sandro Botticelli: Madonna of the Magnificat, c.1485, tempera on panel, 118 x 118 cm, tondo. Uffizi, Florence. Public Domain, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madonna_of_the_Magnificat#/media/File:Botticelli_Uffizi_37.j pg. Plate 21: Anna Lea Merritt: Love Locked Out, 1890, oil on canvas, 115.6 x 64.1 cm. Tate Collection. Photograph © Tate, 2015. Plate 22: Die Galluspforte portal. Münster, Basle, north side, 1180. Plate 23: John Everett Millais: The Foolish Virgins, illustration to „The Parables of Our Lord‟, 1864, wood engraving by the Dalziel Brothers, 14.0 x 10.8 cm. Tate Collection. Photograph © Tate, 2015. Plate 24: William Orpen: Ready to Start, 1917, oil on canvas, 60 x 50.8 cm. Imperial War Museum. Public Domain, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:William_Orpen- Ready_to_Start-1917.jpg. Plate 25: Winifred Knights: a woman with blonde hair, 1918-1919, watercolour on paper, tondo. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 26: Winifred Knights: a woman working beside farm buildings, 1918, watercolour on paper. Private collection (Catherine Monnington). Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 27: Winifred Knights: Ludlow Fair and Cattle Market, 1919, watercolour and pencil on paper, 29.5 x 32.2 cm. UCL Art Museum. Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 28: Augustus John: A Family Group (also known as Decorative Group), 1908-1909, oil on canvas, 201.9 x 173.4 cm. Dublin City Gallery, the Hugh Lane. Plate 29: Winifred Knights: Village Street: Mill-Hands Conversing, 1919, tempera on canvas, 91.5 x 122 cm. UCL Art Museum. Image approved for use by copyright holder. Photograph approved for use through CC Licence, UCL Art Museum. Plate 30: James Wilkie: Reconstruction: A Horse and Cart with Figures in a Sandpit, 1919, oil on canvas, 91.5 x 122 cm. UCL Art Museum. Image approved for use through CC Licence, UCL Art Museum. Plate 31: Winifred Knights: The Deluge, 1920, oil on canvas, 152.4 x 183 cm. Tate Collection. Image approved for use by copyright holder. Photograph © Tate, 2015. Plate 32: Winifred Knights: Leaving the Munitions Works, 1919, watercolour on paper, 27 x 32 cm. Private collection. Image approved for use by copyright holder. Plate 33: Arthur Outlaw: The Deluge, 1920, oil on canvas, 152.4 x 177.8 cm. Private collection. Plate 34: Leon Underwood: The Deluge, 1920, oil on canvas, 152.4 x 177.8 cm, as illustrated in The Daily Graphic, 8th February 1921. Location of painting unknown. Plate 35: James Wilkie: The Deluge, 1920, oil on canvas, 152.4 x 177.8 cm, as illustrated in The Daily Graphic, 8th February 1921. Location of painting unknown. 5 Plate 36: Percy Wyndham Lewis: Kermesse, 1910, watercolour, gouache, pen and pencil on paper, 30.2 x 30.5 cm. Yale Center for British Art. Thumbnail downloaded under terms of Fair Use.