Lot 54 , William Gear RA RBSA, 1915-1997, 'Untitled 1948'

§ William Gear RA RBSA (1915-1997)
'Untitled 1948',
signed and dated lower right,
ink on paper,
44cm x 61cm

Provenance: From the family of the artist

This drawing reflects Gear's interest in Pablo Picasso and Joan Miró, whose technique of 'taking a line for a walk' is well illustrated here with offshoots terminated in arrows and X's. The shading gives a shallow, three-dimensional effect and the low horizon suggests an opaque object on a sea shore.
Gear visited the artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham in St. Ives in 1948 resulting in a series of loosely abstracted boat and harbour related works.

Scottish artist William Gear was born in Methil, Fife, and attended Edinburgh College of Art. In 1937 he studied briefly under Fernand Léger in Paris. After the war Gear worked in Germany, mounting exhibitions for the Allies. From 1948 to 1950 he lived in Paris, where he became affiliated to the COBRA movement. The COBRA artists (the initials stand for Copenhagen, Brussels and Amsterdam, the home cities of many of the group's members), advocated a gestural, near abstract style of painting, influenced by primitivism and the art of children.
1950 he returned to England, where he painted his best-known work, 'Autumn Landscape', recipient of the Festival of Britain Purchase Prize. The painting’s dynamic, abstract forms created a controversy which established him as a well-known artist in the following years.
In 1958, Gear was appointed curator of Towner Art Gallery in Eastbourne. However, the local community was resistant to the Modernist art championed by Gear, and every purchase had to overcome fierce opposition. He later said of this time that “I won the battle, I was a casualty if you like, but I won the battle”. In 1960, two paintings by Gear were included in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition - the first abstract works ever to be shown at the Academy, and which were met with much derision in the press. At the 1962 Summer Exhibition, his submissions were rejected by the RA Hanging Committee, prompting the sculptor FE McWilliam to resign in protest.
In 1964, he was appointed head of the Department of Fine Art at the Birmingham College of Art, remaining there until his retirement in 1975. He also served as chairman of the fine art committee of the Council for National Academic Awards. In 1995, he was elected to the Royal Academy and continued painting throughout the later years of his life.

£250-450