Unknown - Mill Scene

Mill Scene Unknown

Pastel on Paper, Laid Down on a Second, Larger Sheet

11 x 17.5 cm image, 15.5 x 21.5 cm overall

Signed and Dated Indistinctly (lower right)

Signed and Dedicated on the support recto

Inscribed on Support verso

Provenance

Gifted by the artist to David Carr on the occassion of his thirtieth birthday and thence by descent

Sold by Bonhams 5/3/96 lot 55

Private Collection, U.K.

Exhibited

Sunderland Museum and Art Gallery, L.S. Lowry, 27th August - 17th September 1966, cat.no.118 (ill.p23)

Travelling to Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester, Bristol City Art Gallery and London, Tate Gallery

London, The Pastel Society, Centenary Exhibition, 1st - 19th March 2000, cat.p.54 (ill. col.)

Literature

S. Rohde, L.S. Lowry - a biography, the Lowry Press, Manchester, Third edition, 1999(ill.b&w, p.85)

This work is inscribed on the mount "From L.S. Lowry to David Carr - with best wishes" "November 2nd 1945". It is also inscribed on the reverse of the supporting sheet, "One of my first mill drawings done about 1916 or 1917".

The work is referred to in a letter in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum addressed to Mr Carr and dated 31st October 1945 which states:

"I was intending sending you a fairly recent small drawing but came across the enclosed. One of my very very first about 1916 or 1917, + thought it might be more interesting to you. One of those washed pastel ones I told you about if you remember."

Although there are other mill drawings which date from the same period, including The Mill Gates, 1916 (Bloom Collection) and Going to Work, 1917, we have been unable to identify any works of a similar subject that definitely pre-date the present drawing.