Modern British

CHARLES TUNNICLIFFE

1901-1979

Cutting Wheat

Watercolour with bodycolour

Image size: 9 ½ x 7 inches (25 x 18 cm)

Gilt frame

This artwork was used on the front cover of the book "Tunnicliffe 's Countryside", which accompanies the picture. 

Charles Tunnicliffe’s upbringing on a small farm in Cheshire instilled in him a deep appreciation of nature and the countryside. As a youth he spent hours sketching all aspects of farm life. His prodigious talent was quickly recognised and resulted in a scholarship to the local Macclesfield School of Art and later, to the Royal College in London. Here he studied etching under Sir Frank Short and Malcolm Osborne.

In 1928 Tunnicliffe returned to Cheshire with his soon-to-be wife, Winifred. It was she who, in 1929, encouraged him to submit some trial illustrations to the publishers of Henry Williamson’s masterpiece, Tarka the Otter. The wood engravings he produced were met with huge enthusiasm and their success led to further commissions to illustrate Williamson’s texts and well over one hundred other books over the subsequent decades. 

The decline in sales of etchings in the late 1920s and the success of Tarka drove Tunnicliffe ever more towards wood engraving as a graphic medium. He had adapted to it very quickly and the speed and proficiency with which he engraved his blocks were quite remarkable. He told the publishers of A Book of Birds (1937) that he expected to complete between seventy and eighty engravings within three months! His large independent prints, those included in the Memorial Portfolios, were produced between 1934 and the mid-1950s. 

By the time Tunnicliffe was elected a full member of the Royal Academy in 1954 he had become recognised as one of the foremost wildlife artists of the twentieth century. He was awarded the OBE in 1978, shortly before his death the following year.

David Mead
1906 - 1986

Wild Violets

Oil on canvas

Image size: 17 x 21 inches

David Mead was born in London but moved to Whitstable in Kent in 1910, at the age of four. Here he had the good fortune to reside next door to the famous landscape painter Daniel Sherrin, from whom he received guidance and encouragement with his painting. His first watercolours were sold when he was only 12.

He continued to paint and study painting, but it was only after his service in the Air Ministry during WWII that he became a full time artist, painting landscapes in oils, predominately featuring trees and quiet pools. He excelled at painting trees.

He was made a Fellow on the Central Institute of Art & Design in 1946. He founded the Medway Art Society and served as its President for four years. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and one of his paintings is in Horsham Museum.A large proportion of his paintings are now in private collections. 

Peter Hodson

British, 20th Century

Osbaston, Leicestershire in Early Spring

Oil on canvas

Signed and dated 1977/9

Image size: 17.5 x 14.5 inches

Contemporary frame

Josephine Ghilchik (nee Duddle)

1890 - 1981

A Seaside Town

Oil on canvas, signed lower right

Image size: 16 x 19.5 inches

Framed

Josephine Matley Duddle Ghilchik (1890-1981) was the daughter of James Duddle, a musician and teacher of Lancashire, England, and Ellen, his wife.

Josephine studied at the Municipal School of Art, Manchester, England. In 1915, she married the artist and cartoonist, David Louis Ghilchik, who had been her fellow student. Ghilchik was born in 1892 in Botosani, Romania, but had emigrated to Lancashire with his family.

The Ghilchiks resided in and around London. David Ghilchik died in London, England in 1972. At the age of 90, Josephine emigrated to Australia to be with her daughter, Sybil O'Donoghue (an opera singer), and grand-children. She died the following year.

Carolyn Sergeant

20th Century

Yellow Iris with Forget Me Nots

Oil on board

Image size: 16 x 9 inches

Framed

Carolyn Sergeant studied at Wimbledon School of Art from 1955 to 1959 and at the Royal Academy Schools from 1959 to 1962, where she was a silver medallist.  She met her future husband, John Sergeant, at the Royal Academy.

She exhibited all over the United Kingdom, in both solo and mixed shows.  In 2003 she held a solo exhibition at the Fine Art Society in London.

V Ward
American Artillery Soldier
Watercolour and ink
Signed and dated 1918, lower right
Image size: 13½ x 10 inches

V Ward

Unknown Officer in Trench Cap
Watercolour and pencil
Signed and dated 1918, lower right
Image size: 12 x 10 inches