Lot 80: Dora Carrington (British, 1893-1932) Bedford Market 43 x 67 cm. (17 x 26 1/2 in.)

Bedford Market
signed with initials and dated 'DC 1911' (lower right)
pencil, ink and watercolour
43 x 67 cm. (17 x 26 1/2 in.)

PROVENANCE:
With Anthony d'Offay, London, 1980, where purchased by the present owner

EXHIBITED:
London, Anthony d'Offay, Carrington and her Friends, 25 June - 26 July, 1980
London, The Barbican Art Gallery, Carrington - The Exhibition, 21 September - 10 December 1995

LITERATURE:
Jane Hill, The Art of Dora Carrington, The Herbert Press, London, 1994, p.14 (ill.b&w)

The year 1910 was an important one for Carrington, she finally managed to break free from the constraints of her family and found herself at the Slade, living in Gordon Square in the heart of Bloomsbury. Embracing the Bohemian milieu she found herself in, she cut her hair short and became known with two of her contemporaries as 'the crop heads'.

Dated the year after Carrington won her scholarship to the Slade, the present lot shows the influence of the school of art on Carrington's output. Under the leadership of Frederick Brown, with Henry Tonks and Philip Wilson Steer as assistants, the emphasis was on learning to paint by drawing and Carrington temporarily abandoned painting to put into practice what the Slade was preaching. Throughout Carrington's life, she was to draw and paint people and places she loved. This example, depicting the market square of her home town was executed at an interesting juncture in the artist's life.