Building Aircraft: In the Air

Location

Country: UK
City: London
Place: Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, Whitehall

Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson, painter and printmaker, has been described as 'a vital and contentious figure, among the most important British artists of the twentieth century.' Nevinson studied art in London and then in Paris. In March 1914 he became a founding member of the London Group of artists, and in June of that year issued a Futurist manifesto, Vital English Art, with the Italian Futurist artist, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti. During the First World War, Nevinson served in Flanders and France as an ambulance driver and became a member of the Royal Army Medical Corps. In March 1915 his first war paintings were shown at the London Group. In June and July of that year he exhibited as a Futurist at the Vorticist exhibition (Vorticism was a British derivation of Cubism and Futurism) and contributed to the second and last issue of the Vorticist magazine Blast. Nevinson's first solo show, primarily of war paintings, was held in September 1916 at the Leicester Galleries in London, and was a great success. That year he was 'invalided' out of the Army and appointed an Official War Artist in 1917. He became the first artist to draw from the air. In 1919 he visited Paris and New York. He was created Chevalier of the Legion d'Honneur in 1938, and Associate of the Royal Academy in 1939. Suffering deep depression and breakdowns as a result of the outbreak of the Second World War, his health broke down due to overwork and he died in London in October 1946.

Places

Subjects

biplane, aeroplane, topography, WW1 art, landscape C20th, tree, cloud, river, propaganda, World War I, field, road, furrow, bridge (rural), farm

Materials & Techniques

lithograph

Artist

Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson (1889 - 1946)

Title

Building Aircraft: In the Air

Series Title

The Great War: Britain's Efforts and Ideals

Edition

from an edition of 200

Date

published 1919

Medium

Lithograph

Dimensions

height: 47.70 cm, width: 37.80 cm

Acquisition

origin uncertain

Provenance

Foreign and Commonwealth Office, London

GAC number

18505