Lot 17: *FREIDA LOCK (SOUTH AFRICAN, 1902-1962) ‘Little Interior’ signed ‘Freida Lock’ (lower left); inscrib

*FREIDA LOCK (SOUTH AFRICAN, 1902-1962) ‘Little Interior’ signed ‘Freida Lock’ (lower left); inscribed ‘Little Interior’ (verso) oil on canvas 38 x 28cm (14 15/16 x 11in).

Provenance: Purchased directly from the artist. Thence by direct descent to the current owner. During the years between WWI and WWII, London became the training ground for many young South African artists. Freida Lock was one such student, attending Heatherley School of Art and the Central School of Art between 1934 and 1937 where she was introduced to the works of post-Impressionists such as Van Gogh, Cézanne and Braque. Lock would go on to found the New Group on her return to South Africa in 1938 with fellow Heatherley student Gregoire Boonzaier, whom she met through the English artist Percival Small in Cape Town. The influence of this European modernist education exposed what Lock and her contemporaries considered to be the artistic failings of the conservative art establishment in South Africa. The aim of the New Group was “to introduce new concerns and techniques”. Lock is famed for her interior scenes. Influenced in particular by Van Gogh and his indoor works, such as the intimate Bedroom in Arles, she was inspired by Cape Town’s picturesque Dutch Malay homes. Lock herself owned a home at 71 Bree Street and then Westoe in West Mowbray, and would complete studies in and around the rooms and corridors: “She had a way of making a home out of nothing, transforming almost derelict interiors with coats of bright paint”, Desiree Picton-Seymour once commented. The current work is an excellent, intimate example of this subject. A sense of warm intimacy is produced by the narrowing perspective towards an open door, framed by the walls and floors filled with vivid rugs and tapestries. Characteristic of Lock’s handling, the draughtsmanship is quick and the supple lines exaggerate the character of the period architecture and décor. The composition of this work is reminiscent of a similar oil work Interior (1945, Sanlam Collection), where the viewer’s eye is similarly led to the centre of the work with an open door, promising sunlight and space.
Bibliography: E. Bedford, ‘Freida Lock’ in Our Art 4 (Pretoria, 1993), pp. 34-41. E. Berman, Art and Artists of South Africa (Cape Town, 1983).