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Lot 69

Maud Frances Eyston Sumner
(South African, 1902-1985)
Boat wreck and beach

23 March 2011, 14:00 GMT
London, New Bond Street

Sold for £7,200 inc. premium

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Maud Frances Eyston Sumner (South African, 1902-1985)

Boat wreck and beach
signed 'SUMNER' (lower left)
oil on canvas
55 x 46cm (21 5/8 x 18 1/8in).

Footnotes

PROVENANCE:
Sale, Bonhams Knightsbridge, Modern Pictures, 28 June 2001, lot 128
A private collection

The present lot depicts a scene on the Skeleton Coast. Sumner visited Namibia in 1965 and was entranced by what she found. Esme Berman opines that:

"The Namib Desert, with its deceptive vistas, its shimmering colours and forms which shift and melt under the everchanging light, was totally in harmony with her spiritual intentions and emotional needs. Away from the silence - and the chill - of snow-blanketed European landscapes, Maud Sumner looked into and beyond the all-embracing silence of the Namib, and it spoke to her."

BIBLIOGRAPHY:
E. Berman, Art and Artists of South Africa, (Cape Town, 1983) p.443-6

Additional information