Introducing the Jerwood Collection: A Curator’s Choice was the first exhibition of a year-long residency at The Harley Gallery (https://www.harleygallery.co.uk/). Lara Wardle, Executive Director Jerwood Foundation, chose some of her favourite works from the collection. Many of the works are connected to each other, either through the subject matter depicted, or the artists themselves: some artists taught other artists; some were friends; some related; and others were rivals.


Some of the paintings tell part of the wider Jerwood story: prizes that have been awarded or early career artists that have been supported.


This online curation is a selection of works featured in the main auditorium.

15 artworks

.

From My Window at Ditchling
© the artist's estate / Bridgeman Images. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Frank Brangwyn (1867-1956), 'From My Window at Ditchling' c. 1925

This is the first painting that was bought for the Jerwood Collection in June 1993. At the time, the Jerwood Foundation had recently moved to a five storey Georgian house in Fitzroy Square, London. There were lots of rooms with a corresponding amount of empty wall space and, as Alan Grieve (Chairman of Jerwood Foundation) had a personal collection of 20th century British art, he naturally bought works he liked to look at.

The view in the painting is from Brangwyn’s home in Ditchling, Sussex, ‘The Jointure’: the legal term ‘jointure’ refers to lands given to a wife as part of a settlement. The house in the painting was part of the divorce settlement between Henry VIII and Anne of Cleves.

From My Window at Ditchling c.1925
Frank Brangwyn (1867–1956)
Oil on board
H 66 x W 73.6 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Saint Francis
© the artist's estate / Bridgeman Images. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Craigie Aitchison RA (1926-2009) 'St Francis', 1993

St Francis of Assisi is thought of as the patron saint of animals and the natural environment. In this jewel-like painting, both in size and colour, St Francis is shown gently embracing two birds. The distinctive pointy hill behind St Francis is Goat Fell on the Isle of Arran which Aitchison was familiar with from childhood visits.

Saint Francis 1993
Craigie Ronald John Aitchison (1926–2009)
Oil on canvas
H 30.5 x W 25.5 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

The Blue Towel
© the estate of Euan Uglow / Bridgeman Images. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Euan Uglow (1932-2000) 'The Blue Towel', 1982-83

Time feels like it has been distorted in this small painting as we see one of Uglow’s models in three different poses, related to her habit of collecting a towel, having a shower, and leaving, when she stayed at Turnchapel Mews in London, where Uglow lived and worked.

Euan Uglow was great friends with Craigie Aitchision and they were both shortlisted for the Jerwood Painting Prize in 1994, the year that Aitchison won (and his Crucifixion painting entered the collection).

The Blue Towel 1982
Euan Uglow (1932–2000)
Oil on canvas laid on plywood
H 25 x W 24 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Crucifixion
© the artist's estate / Bridgeman Images. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Craigie Aitchison RA (1926-2009) 'Crucifixion', 1994

This is the painting which won Craigie Aitchison the first Jerwood Painting Prize in 1994, the most valuable art prize to be awarded in the UK at the time. Alan Grieve recalls that, ‘at the moment of the winning announcement, Aitchison could not be found. He had to be retrieved from a nearby pub’.

Crucifixion 1994
Craigie Ronald John Aitchison (1926–2009)
Oil on canvas
H 106.7 x W 96.5 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Back Drop
© estate of Prunella Clough. All rights reserved, DACS 2024. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Prunella Clough (1919-1999) 'Backdrop', 1993

Prunella Clough won the Jerwood Painting Prize in 1999, poignantly the year that she died. This painting is typical of Clough’s more abstract later work and is very different from her earlier paintings. Have a look at the small canal painting, below to see how these two periods of Clough’s work compare.

Back Drop 1993
Prunella Clough (1919–1999)
Oil on canvas
H 155 x W 137 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Grand Union Canal
© estate of Prunella Clough. All rights reserved, DACS 2024. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Prunella Clough (1919-1999) 'Grand Union Canal', circa 1951

This small, rather sombre work, painted in the post-war doldrums of the 1950s, feels in marked contrast to her rather more joyful and colourful large canvas.

Grand Union Canal c.1951
Prunella Clough (1919–1999)
Oil on board
H 25.5 x W 32 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Frances Rose (2)
© the artist / Bridgeman Images. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Maggi Hambling (b. 1945) 'Frances Rose (2)', 1973

Frances Rose was Maggi Hambling’s neighbour in Battersea, London, where Hambling lived and worked from 1968 to 1984. When Alan Grieve bought the painting for the Jerwood Collection in 1995, Hambling wrote to Alan about the sitter: ‘In 1973 she was a widow in her 80s, had been in ‘service’ and still took in washing. She had severe arthritis in her hands, enjoyed drinking Guinness and sewed bells to the knees of long red knickers for the old people’s annual Christmas party’.

Maggi Hambling was the joint winner of the Jerwood Painting Prize with Patrick Caulfield in 1995.

Frances Rose (2) 1973
Maggi Hambling (b.1945)
Oil on canvas
H 119.5 x W 91.5 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Canal Bridge
© The Estate of L.S. Lowry. All Rights Reserved, DACS 2024. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Laurence Stephen Lowry RA (1887-1976) 'The Canal Bridge', 1944

Laurence Stephen Lowry is often thought of a painter of a bustling scene peopled with diminutive ‘matchstick men’ that hurry backwards and forwards, however many of his paintings were industrial and yet unpopulated. This painting depicts the top lock at Fairfield on the Ashton Canal, which was completed in 1797 and joined Manchester with Ashton-under-Lyne. Lowry believed that you should ‘paint the place you know’ and this view would have been well known to him. In this painting, the focus is the hump-back bridge, which was built high enough to allow horse-drawn barges laden with goods to pass under it.

Canal Bridge 1944
Laurence Stephen Lowry (1887–1976)
Oil on board
H 47.5 x W 30 cm
Jerwood Collection

Cedric Morris (1889-1982) 'Blackbird and Pears', 1952

Cedric Morris shows us his great passion for the natural world in the joyful colours and attention to detail in this painting. Having turned his back on the London art scene in the late 1920s Morris and his partner, Arthur Lett-Haines moved to Suffolk and later set up the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing. Maggi Hambling, whose painting is hanging nearby, was one of the pupils who was taught at the school as well as Lucian Freud, who joined at the young age of seventeen.

Blackbird and Flowers 1952
Cedric Lockwood Morris (1889–1982)
Oil on canvas
H 85.8 x W 111.8 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Flowers in a Terracotta Pot
© the estate of David Bomberg. All rights reserved, DACS 2024. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

David Bomberg (1890-1957) 'Flowers in a Terracotta Pot', 1945

This was bought at the same Sotheby’s sale in June 1993 as the Frank Brangwyn painting. We have it listed as the second painting bought but that is simply down to the lot order of the sale: the Brangwyn was lot 15 and this painting by David Bomberg was lot 49.

Flowers in a Terracotta Pot 1945
David Bomberg (1890–1957)
Oil on canvas laid on panel
H 73.7 x W 58.5 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Saturday Wait
© courtesy of the artist and Simon Lee Gallery. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Clare Woods (b. 1972) 'Saturday Wait', 2019

Painted nearly a lifetime after David Bomberg’s still life, Saturday Wait by contemporary artist, Clare Woods, shares a similar sombre palette of colours. Woods paints on aluminium which gives her a very smooth surface to push the paint across and create sharp crisp edges between some of the colours. In contrast Bomberg’s painting is softer, but both feel a bit gloomy. Plants and flowers are best in the ground (as in Cedric Morris’s joyful painting): once cut, their time has been shortened and there is an element of urgency for a painter to capture them before they wilt.

Saturday Wait 2019
Clare Woods (b.1972)
Oil on aluminium
H 100 x W 100 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Profile and Brushes
© the artist's estate. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Roy Oxlade (1929-2014) 'Profile & Brushes', 1984-1985

Roy Oxlade penned one of my favourite quotes about painting: ‘Painting is a funny business … it falls between the extremes of music and literature – both of which can be done seriously in the head in the way painting can’t’.

Roy Oxlade is closely connected to two of the artists whose work is hanging nearby. He was taught by David Bomberg at Borough Polytechnic; and was married to Rose Wylie.

Profile and Brushes 1984–1985
Roy Oxlade (1929–2014)
Oil on canvas
H 120.2 x W 152 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Esme by the Railings
© Courtesy the Artist and Victoria Miro, London. Image credit: Stephen White. Image courtesy of Victoria Miro, London.

Chantal Joffe RA (b. 1969) 'Esme by the Railings', 2014

Esme is Chantal Joffe’s daughter and appears in many of her paintings. Although it is an unusual portrait, with part of Esme’s head and feet cropped out of the painting, we immediately recognise the ubiquitous green crocs she is wearing and her off-hand childish stance.

Esme by the Railings 2014
Chantal Joffe (b.1969)
Oil on canvas
H 40.5 x W 30.5 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

Self Portrait with Shut Mouth
© the artist. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Rose Wylie RA (b. 1934) 'Self Portrait with Shut Mouth', 2017

Not a self-portrait in any traditional sense, more just a pair of giant lips but, that’s just it, isn’t it? A self-portrait is not what the viewer expects to see, or thinks they might see, but how the artist sees themselves.

Self Portrait with Shut Mouth 2017
Rose Wylie (b.1934)
Hand drawn lithograph on paper
H 63 x W 89 cm
Jerwood Collection

.

The Evil Eye
© the artist. Image credit: Jerwood Collection

Sofia Mitsola (b. 1992) 'The Evil Eye', 2019

This bold painting is by the youngest artist whose work is held in the collection. There is no escaping the direct gaze of the three young women portrayed and, as we look up at the painting, we become an object of scrutiny ourselves. Depending how you feel today, looking at the painting might make you feel a bit uncomfortable, or it might feel quite empowering.

The Evil Eye 2019
Sofia Mitsola (b.1992)
Oil on canvas
H 220 x W 170 cm
Jerwood Collection