Laurence Stephen Lowry, R.A. (1887-1976)

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THE FREDERICK FORSYTH COLLECTION OF PAINTINGS BY L.S. LOWRY INTRODUCTION by Frederick Forsyth I have liked the works of Lowry for a long time but only began to acquire a few some thirteen years ago. Had I been smarter I would have begun a decade before that, rather than investing in other areas. There is something about the figures in his pictures that intrigues me; all seem to be locked in thought, some pressing forward upon a personal errand, some gazing melancholy into the distance, others about to say something to the figure next to them. They are alive with the concerns of every day, but caught and locked into perpetuity by Lowry's gentle eye. And always the spindle-legged dogs of exactly the same type running among them. Although preferring the street scenes to the seascapes, I have tried to build over a dozen years a small collection covering Lowry's last and best twenty years. Photo Frederick Forsyth Frederick Forsyth was born in Ashford, Kent, in August 1938, the son of two shopkeepers and after brief evacuations during the war went in 1948 to Yardley Court Preparatory School at Tonbridge. From there he won a scholarship to Tonbridge School, leaving aged 17 to join the RAF. After getting his wings on Vampires at the age of 19, he moved onto journalism. Three years were spent as a reporter on the Eastern Daily Press in Norfolk, followed by a move to London and the agency Reuters. With them he covered Paris, East Berlin, Prague, Budapest, Bonn, West Berlin, Brussels and Rome. After four years, in 1965, he joined the BBC, becoming Assistant Diplomatic Correspondent in 1967 at the age of 28. Twelve months later he left to go into the jungles of Biafra as a freelance. Two years later he returned to London broke and jobless and decided to write down a story he had devised years earlier in Paris when covering the repeated attempts by the OAS to kill Charles de Gaulle. He called it The Day of the Jackal. After being hawked around London for much of 1970, the manuscript found a publisher in Hutchinson, who also commissioned two further novels, which became The Odessa File and The Dogs of War. Since leaving journalism for full time writing in 1971, he has published ten novels and an anthology of short stories. He decided in 1997 to call it a day (at least insofar as political thrillers were concerned) and try something else - as yet undecided! Now aged 62, he lives with his second wife on his farm in Hertfordshire. He has two sons, aged 20 and 22.

Laurence Stephen Lowry, R.A. (1887-1976)

Northern River Scene

Details

Laurence Stephen Lowry, R.A. (1887-1976)
Northern River Scene
signed and dated 'L.S. LOWRY 1959' (lower right)
oil on canvas
20 x 30 in. (50.8 x 76.2 cm.)

Provenance

Anon. sale; Christie's, 7 November 1991, lot 115, where purchased by the present owner.

Literature

D. McLean, L.S. Lowry, London, 1978, p. 19 (illustrated).

Exhibited

London, Lefevre Gallery, New Paintings by L.S. Lowry, October 1961, no. 32.
Manchester, Whitworth Art Gallery, Modern Pictures from the Bernstein and Granada Collection, 1965, no. 20.
Sunderland, Art Gallery, Arts Council, L.S. Lowry, R.A. Retrospective Exhibition, August-September 1966, no. 85; this exhibition travelled to Manchester, Whitworth Art Gallery; Bristol, City Art Gallery; and London, Tate Gallery.
Liverpool, Walker Art Gallery, L.S. Lowry An Exhibition to celebrate the 125th Anniversary of the Liverpool Trades Council, April-June 1973, no. 65.

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

Lot Essay

In 1950, Lowry was commissioned by Sir Geoffrey de Freitas, K.C.M.G., the Member of Parliament for Lincoln, to paint a view of the city, the only specification being the inclusion of the cathedral in the composition. The river and the canal tow path appealed far more to the artist and he made several sketches from the banks of the canal at twilight, when the factory workers were going home. In the finished painting, the cathedral sits far back in the composition above the canal and the terraced houses. Lowry later explained how this view had inspired the present work, 'A few years ago I was asked to do a picture of Lincoln with the cathedral in it. I chose this part of the river, which is quite industrial, with the cathedral in the background centre of the picture - later on I thought this setting would make an industrial picture, but instead of the cathedral, putting a factory building with a tower in place of the cathedral. I elaborated upon the theme making it more industrial until eventually it came out what you see. But as I say the basis of the picture was the quite industrial nature of the scene as it actually was' (letter from L.S. Lowry, dated 11 August 1962, see D. McLean, loc. cit.).

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