Bonhams 1793 : Winifred Nicholson (British, 1893-1981) Amy in the Kitchen at Banks Head 61 x 56 cm. (24 x 22 in.)

Amy in the Kitchen at Banks Head
signed and dated 'Winifred Nicholson 1928' (on the canvas overlap)
oil on canvas
61 x 56 cm. (24 x 22 in.)
Please note that this work is doublesided with a portrait of Vera Moore playing piano (verso)

Estimate:

£25,000 - 35,000
€29,000 - 41,000
US$ 38,000 - 53,000

Footnotes

PROVENANCE:
With Kettle's Yard, Cambridge, where acquired by the family of the present owner

EXHIBITED:
Kendal, Abbot Hall Art Gallery, A Painter's Place, August 1991-July 1992, no.13; this exhibition toured to Tullie House Museum and Art Gallery, Carlisle, 7 August25 September 1991, Kettle's Yard, Cambridge, 5 October30 November, York City Art Gallery 14 December 199126 January 1992, Pallant House, Chichester, 7 February30 March and Abbot Hall Art Gallery, Kendal 10 April12 June 1992
Cambridge, Kettle's Yard, Winifred Nicholson, 28 July23 September 2001; this exhibition toured to Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield, 6 October17 November and Tullie House Museum and Art Gallery, Carlisle 24 November 200113 January 2002

LITERATURE:
Abbot Hall Art Gallery, A Painter's Place, exh.cat, August 1991 - July 1992, p.30 (ill.)
Kettle's Yard, Winifred Nicholson, exh.cat, 28 July - 23 September 2001, p.26 (ill.)

Almost all of the portraits painted by Winifred Nicholson are of people that she was close to: her husband and children, her father-in-law William Nicholson, Christopher Wood, her brother Wilfrid Roberts and his children, and helpers Cissy Noble, Janet Warwick and Amy Little. Most of these portraits were painted in the late 1920s and the early 1930s. There are two known portraits of Amy Little (see Winifred Nicholson, Christopher Andreae, Lund Humphries, Farnham p.81) one of which was included when Winifred Nicholson exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 1934 (no.88 'Amy').

Winifred Nicholson wrote, "I painted the picture you have shown me - it is a Banks Head Cumberland - a portrait of Amy Little who lived near us and she had beautiful red hair. On the back is a portrait of Vera Moore the well known pianist who now lives near Paris" (letter to the family of the present owner dated 22nd November 1972, included with this lot). The concert pianist Vera Moore was a close friend of Winifred Nicholson and was Constantin Brancusi's partner. The Cumbrian artist Donald Wilkinson wrote "Amy thinks this is the one she remembers so clearly Winifred painting when Christopher Wood was staying she remembers the flowers especially" (in a letter to the family of the present owner dated December 1988). Christopher Wood stayed with the Nicholsons at their home Bankshead in Cumberland in March and April 1928.

We are grateful to Jovan Nicholson for his assistance in cataloguing this work and compiling the catalogue entry.