The Outpost, 1939
From September 2014 to February 2015 we used Pictures of the Month to illustrate Edwin's journey from a painter of conventional landscapes in the 1930s to producing Surrealist works that are quite unlike anything his contemporaries were doing in the 40s and early 50s.
In November 2014 we featured The Outpost, painted in October 1939. It is annotated "Op.4 No.3" on the back and is one of a series of works Edwin annotated in this way when he first started working in his own studio. We know he started renting a studio from Wilhelmina Barns-Graham in 1939 and that he suddenly started producing a lot of Surrealist drawings and paintings in August 1939. We think he probably moved into the studio at the start of August and immediately started giving his paintings "Opus" numbers as follows:
The musical terminology of these works begs comparison with some of Paul Klee's work. Klee produced a set of etchings between 1903 and 1905 that he termed his Opus 1, subtitled "Inventionen" (another musical term). Interestingly, he later referred to these as "surrealistic outposts".
In November 2014 we featured The Outpost, painted in October 1939. It is annotated "Op.4 No.3" on the back and is one of a series of works Edwin annotated in this way when he first started working in his own studio. We know he started renting a studio from Wilhelmina Barns-Graham in 1939 and that he suddenly started producing a lot of Surrealist drawings and paintings in August 1939. We think he probably moved into the studio at the start of August and immediately started giving his paintings "Opus" numbers as follows:
- He created three Opus 2 works in August 1939. The first is a watercolour showing the aftermath of a party, including several dozen beer bottles. We guess this was his house-warming party! The other Opus 2 works are his first Surrealist paintings, Diagnosis 1 and The Shape of the Night. These were also two of his first oil paintings (with just a couple of exceptions painted previously). By the way, we guess he started with Opus 2 as a way of differentiating his new work from his previous work which mainly consisted of watercolour landscapes.
- Opus 3 consists of a few watercolour landscapes he painted in October 1939. He also called these "Divertimentos", this being a musical term for "light" works. We think Edwin used this term to differentiate these watercolours from his new Surrealist oil paintings.
- Opus 4 was also painted in October 1939. No record remains of the first one, the second is Moonlit Walk which we featured last month, and the third is this painting, The Outpost.
The musical terminology of these works begs comparison with some of Paul Klee's work. Klee produced a set of etchings between 1903 and 1905 that he termed his Opus 1, subtitled "Inventionen" (another musical term). Interestingly, he later referred to these as "surrealistic outposts".
