Lot 51: AUGUSTUS LUNN 1905-1986

SIGNED AND DATED (MAKER'S MARKS)
signed and dated 44

127 by 89cm., 50 by 35in.

tempera on board

Bournemouth, Russell Coates Art Gallery, Exhibition of Contemporary Tempera, 1949;

Augustus Lunn studied at the Kingston School of Art before winning a scholarship to the Royal Academy, where he was later to exhibit his work, as also at the New English Art Club and with the London Group. He was a key figure in the revival of tempera painting in Britain, as well as a dedicated muralist, in between stints as both a draughtsman and teacher. He consequently produced relatively little 'canvas' work, although David Buckman notes that when Lunn did paint, his small output was concentrated to yield pictures of the highest 'finished' quality (Dictionary of Artists in Britain since 1945, Art Dictionaries, Bristol, 1998, p.771). Lunn's admiration of Giorgio de Chirico and Fernand Leger is frequently strongly apparent in his work, and he often combines surrealism with a tendency towards abstraction: "I am never interested in recording a scene. I want to reconstruct" (quoted ibid.).