Lot 93: Augustus Lunn, A.R.C.A. (1905-1986)

Gale Warning
signed and dated 'Augustus Lunn/38' (upper right), signed again and inscribed 'Augustus Lunn/11, Church Rd, East Molesey/Surrey' (on the reverse), signed again and inscribed again 'Gale Warning/Augustus Lunn/11. Church Road/East Molesey' (on a label attached to the reverse)
tempera on board
40 1/2 x 24 3/4 in. (102.9 x 62.8 cm.)
Painted circa 1937.

London, New Burlington Galleries, London Group. Thirty-seventh exhibition of Painting and Sculpture, November - December 1938, no. 180, as 'Coast Defences'.
London, Royal Academy, The second United Artists' exhibition, in aid of H.R.H. the Duke of Gloucester's Red Cross and St. John Fund, January - March 1942, catalogue not traced.
possibly, Bournemouth, Russell-Cotes Art Gallery, Exhibition of Works by Eminent Living Artists, March - May 1945, no. 939.
Finland, Retretti Art Centre, Surrealismi-Surrealism, May - September 1987, as 'Coastguards Look Out', not numbered.
Chichester, Festival Exhibition, The Tudor Room of the Bishop's Palace, Sea, Sail and Shore, June - July 1991, no. 29.
London, Michael Parkin Fine Art, Augustus Lunn, March - April 1985, no. 19.

Exhibition catalogue, London Group. Thirty-seventh exhibition of Painting and Sculpture, London, New Burlington Galleries, 1938, p. 8, no. 180, as 'Coast Defences'.
Exhibition catalogue, Surrealismi-Surrealism, Finland, Retretti Art Centre, 1987, p. 144.

Augustus Lunn was born in Lancashire and moved to Surbiton in 1918. Lunn became one of the leading figures amongst a group of artists between the wars who sought to bring about a revival in the technique of tempera painting. Other artists to exhibit alongside Lunn were Edward Wadsworth, John Armstrong, Eliot Hodgkin, Maxwell Armfield and Joseph Southall.
The present work illustrates his rapid response to the International Surrealist Exhibition. He constructs a space which deliberately leaves the spectator disorientated and unsettled. One's eye attempts to survey the tilted perspectives which the image continually prevents. Of his use and choice of tempera he states 'For centuries it was the custom to carry out the painting first with a monochrome underpainting. The monochrome for the flesh painting was in terravert (green); the warm flesh colour was used over this cool green underpainting and produced these so-called optical greys. You can never get those any other way than tempera. I may sound rather cut and dried but I was never interested in oil painting of the 'shove it on and put it around' school. Also, I am never interested in recording a scene. I want to reconstruct.' (see J. Southall, Papers of the Society of Tempera Painters, 1934)

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