Paul Nash’s leadership of Unit One faltered during the winter of 1934 and 1935. Abstraction and Surrealism, which he hoped might be reconciled in some manner of creative tension, increasingly came to be seen as alternatives, as polarities rather than compatibilities by the coterie of artists he had corralled to the cause. Despite his advocacy and his organisational energies, he could not hold the circle together and as the new year dawned, it was clear his hegemony in the British art world was slipping away.

He took refuge in Dorset. Through his painting he sought to forge a personal vision that could coalesce around modernism without losing its innate Englishness. The Purbecks gave him the platform to explore this challenge, to find a middle way between dynamic, at times diverging, pictorial styles and languages.

Over the previous year, as he and Margaret intermittently visited Dorset, he had befriended Archibald Russell, an amateur naturalist, collector of drawings by Old Masters, authority on William Blake, and Lancaster Herald, who lived in Scar Bank House, part of a sizeable estate on the southern side of Swanage Bay, spanning the ridge at Durlstone. Many meals and evenings were spent with ‘Archie’ Russell and his wife, Janet. By way of reciprocation the Nashs hosted a Christmas Eve party in December 1934 for their many new friends dotted around the Isle of Purbeck.

In 1935 Nash had started to use a Riddell Inhaler which improved his breathing, eased his ailments and allowed greater mobility. At the end of January he wrote to Conrad Aitken of ‘this curiously healthy country’ and enthused about some recent paintings, indicating that he had achieved a minor breakthrough:

“For some weeks I worked contrarily and seemed to be getting nowhere but just lately I feel somehow released, my doubts are melting away.” (Paul Nash to Conrad Aitken, 31 January 1935)

As his health improved and his paintings made progress, Nash was invited by Jack Beddington, director of publicity at Shell, to edit a new Dorset Shell Guide, a motor-tourist’s guide to the county. The invitation appeared out of the blue, but it later transpired that series editor John Betjeman, an admirer of Paul’s work, had played a key part in securing the commission.

Seeking now to remain in Dorset for the foreseeable future, the Nashs moved from Whitecliffe and took up residence in Swanage town, renting for £7.02 a week a house on the sea front, No.2 The Parade, a terrace of houses built by Mowlem and Burt in the late

1890s. (The house is now marked with a Blue Plaque, noting their dates of residence.)

Nash found the location highly conducive. In their new residence, he worked towards a one-person exhibition at the Redfern Gallery in London, which opened in April 1935. Of the 61 watercolours and drawings shown at the Redfern, no fewer than 20 were derived from Purbeck sites. Critical reviews were positive:

“… the best one-man show that has been seen in London this year … such purely representational work as ‘Dorset Landscape’ , ‘Swanage’ and ‘Waves’ with the deep conviction of their convictions for the English country and coast, are better than anything the artist has done before.” (The Daily Telegraph, 9 April 1935)

As was their habit, Margaret and Paul spent significant periods of time apart that year. Industrious and engaged in his art, Paul was looked after by landlady Mrs Bradford, and maintained an active social life with Janet Russell, Hilda Felce and others in the town and county. Invigorated by his stabilising health and by the surroundings of Swanage and the Purbecks, Nash entered his most productive phase in Dorset producing nearly forty watercolours and works on papers, and four oils, including the important canvas ‘Landscape from a Dream’.

In the summer of 1935 Nash met the painter Eileen Agar and her close friend Joseph Bard, who had taken up residence nearby in Swanage, at Clarence Cottage in Chapel Lane. Increasingly close as artists and intimate friends, Paul and Eileen spent prolonged periods in each other’s company, much of it recorded in passionate letters and diaries. Agar gathered shells, stones and objects from the seashore as inspirational gifts for Paul. One such object trouve, an ancient iron anchor, a ‘stone and iron monster’, was uncovered from pebbles on the beach in Lulworth Cove. Resembling an encrusted snake with a bird’s beak, Nash later photographed and incorporated it into a striking photo-collage Swanage (1936) now in the Tate Gallery.

That year Nash arranged to be photographed by a young local photographer Helen Muspratt who in 1929, at the age of just 21, had set up in business in Swanage with a studio at 10 Institute Road, just behind The Parade. Muspratt (1907-2001) would subsequently open studios in Cambridge and Oxford, and later became recognised as a remarkable and eminent portrait photographer, recording some of the leading figures and events of the 20th century. Her preoccupation with the face, its ‘shape and angle’, led her to experiment with solarisation, rayographs and multiple exposures. Her 1935 solarised portrait of Eileen Agar became one of her most celebrated photographs. (See Helen Muspratt exhibition Bodleian, 2020, https://visit.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/event/helen-muspratt-photographer#listing_2473506_0 )

Nash was now aged 46, and as particular about his appearance as he had been in his youth.

“I enclose some pretty grim photographs, do I really look like that? But I don’t mind No 1 so much and if 5 had not been so very touched up to save my wrinkles it might be possible. You can see my uneven eyes … also one side of my mouth seems to have got depressed more than the other.” Paul Nash to Margaret Nash, 1935

Seeking a more permanent place to live, the Nash’s were offered a plot of land on their estate by the Russells. Overlooking the bay from the quarries on the edge of Durlston the plot included a modest stone shed, ‘Old Barn’ which Nash sketched for Eileen Agar, asking her, from his London address, to make further measurements to help inform his ideas for development.

Despite enlisting the support of friends and commissioning the modernist architect F. R. S. Yorke, Nash reluctantly abandoned the project for lack of funds and because it was clear his fragile health could not be exposed to the rigours of such an isolated location. In a rather despairing letter to Margaret (8 November 1935), he described the project as ‘Nash’s folly is what it was and nothing else.’

Unable to drive and without his own transport, Nash was often taken across Dorset by Janet Russell or Hilda Felce so that he could gather images and information for the Shell Guide.

Margaret recalled that:

This enabled Paul to make wonderful and extensive studies of Dorset, and he collected a large number of photographs with his beloved Kodak No.2, and also produced an astonishing number of drawings and water colours. Gradually he recovered his vitality and work poured out in every kind of experiment, especially in the direction of Surrealism, which at this time had begun to stimulate his imagination.

By December 1935, he informed John Betjeman that the text was almost ready for publication.

It proved to be a quite different publication from others in the series. Whereas Betjeman had focussed his own recent guide to Cornwall on historic buildings, ancient towns and built form, Paul Nash concentrated almost entirely on ancient monuments, sacred landscape and coastal scenery. It was as if the villages and towns were invisible to him:

“I remember nothing so beautifully haunted as the wood in Badbury Rings…Beyond the outer plateau the rings heave up and round in waves 40 feet high. A magic bird in a haunted wood, an ancient cliff washed by a sea changed into earth.”

1935 was the most productive year of the many Paul Nash spent in the Purbecks. The forty or so watercolours, pencil drawings, and chalks covered topics and sites from across Dorset, from those in the west at Cerne Abbas (Causey, 827) to favoured sites such as Badbury Rings (821). Closer to Swanage, he was drawn to the Blue Pool near Wareham (826), and the ominous motif of Corfe Castle seen from the Heath (831, 832). But it was the coastal edge that clearly gripped his poetic imagination, with more than half of the year’s work derived from the jagged cliffs, the sands, or the piers along the Jurassic coast. Many of the works on paper would be reproduced in the Dorset Guide, on occasion being somewhat diminished by the power of his writing.

The headland to the east of Swanage Bay dominated the view from the balcony of their flat at The Parade. Ballard Head, Swanage (822) is a typical rendition of the promontory, with its broad grassy back, steep striated cliffs and distinctive stacks and pillars poking out of the bay. The headland appears in the background of numerous topographic works and memorably in the larger poetic oils. In a watercolour painted from The Parade (845), the gleaming white headland is mirrored by great piles of cumulus clouds on the horizon, a compositional device first used in such compositions as The Menin Road (1919) where cloud formations are used as surrogate foliage and forests, juxtaposed with the denuded and desolate battlefields.

In several more overtly symbolic paintings produced in 1935, such as Empty Room, the Cretaceous chalk cliffs of Ballard Point are given dramatic prominence, the finger of rock known as The Pinnacle dominates the end wall of the confined interior, with the block of Old Harry Rock set in the distance. It is clear that Nash studied these headlands closely and grasped their geological nature.

Closer to home, he was fascinated by the Old Quay and the Pier that could be looked down upon from The Parade. He painted the view many times that year, embellishing its sweeping curves and arabesque forms in rhythmic watercolours and drawings. They are in marked contrast to the more prosaic photographs of the same scene, which are muted, matt black and white snaps of moist cobbles and placid waters. In Sea Wall (855), Pier (831), Storm (862), Swanage (863) and The Tide (865) - all from 1935 – Nash presents the sea walls holding back tidal torrents, waves crashing over the stonework, interrupting the architectural integrity of the scene. Despite their restrained and restricted palette, which was so distinctive of Nash’s work during that decade, Boyd Haycock suggests a restlessness that mirrored the painter’s passionate affairs of that year. A Freudian reading, he asserts, might note ‘something rather phallic’ in Nash’s sea wall, an allusion perhaps to the relationship with Eileen Agar. (David Boyd Haycock, Paul Nash, Piano Nobile Gallery, p.66)

Whatever its psychological root, these highly articulate images when shown in London that year attracted ready admiration. Writing in The Observer, the critic Jan Gordon regarded Nash’s work of that year ‘proves once again, if it needed any proof that he is one of the most subtle observers and recorders of the moods of landscape in the world of contemporary art.’

1935

Mineral Objects

oil on canvas, H 50.2 x W 60.3 cm

References

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.815.

Roger Cardinal, The Landscape Vision of Paul Nash (London: Reaktion, 1989).

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.no.7, p.89.

Paul Nash, Outline: An Autobiography and Other Writings, with a preface by Herbert Read (London: Faber and Faber, 1948).

Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 2007

https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:10543

1935

Objects in Relation

oil on canvas, H 50.8 x W 61.0 cm

References

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.816, p.430.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.8.

Margot Eates, The Master of the Image 1889-1946 (London: John Murray, 1973) p.60, 62.

St Paul’s School,

London, Tate image ID:M00455

1935

Arishmel Gap

Watercolour, H 28.0 x W 38.1 cm

References

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.820, p.430..

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.9

1935

Badbury Rings

Pencil and watercolour, H 28.6 x W 38.7 cm

References

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) p.222, 238.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.821, p.430, plate 318.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.10.

Note: this was the work drawn specially for the Dorset Shell Guide (1936), page 20, opposite Gazetteer, see https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/orbis:3824190. 'Hilly Landscape' (see below) was probably made during the same drawing excursion, later to be dated mistakingly by Margaret Nash as 1931, but it is highly likely to have been made during the trip to the Rings in 1935.

1935

Ballard Head, Swanage

Pencil, chalk and watercolour, H 24.8 x W34.6 cm

References

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.822, p.430, illus.526.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.11.

1935

Ballard Landscape

Chalk and watercolour, H 17.4 x W 25.1 cm

References

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.823, p.430.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.12.

Cecil Higgins Museum, Bedford, 1956.

1935

Ballard Phantom

Pencil and watercolour, H 40.6 x W 58.5 cm

References

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) p.244.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.824, p.430.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.13.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

The Blue Pool, Dorset

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 38.1 x W 55.9 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.826, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.14.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Cerne Abbas Giant

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 28.0 x W 38.1 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.827, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.15.

Sold through Sotheby’s

http://www.artnet.com/artists/paul-nash/the-cerne-abbas-giant-dorset-Vv3wczhXgYsOdjm2dY8DVw2

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Comment on Leda

Medium and dimensions: Pencil, chalk and watercolour,

H 28 x W 39.5 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.830, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.17.

The swan-like object in this delicate artwork from 1935 was based on part of a cabriole chair, which also appears in a 1934 photograph by Nash ‘Still Life, A Chair Leg Beside Water’. The coincidence of finding swan-like objects in Swanage deeply appealed to Nash, he recounted ‘when walking up the Institute Road, I was attracted by an object in a turner’s shop window which seemed to resemble a swan in a peculiar degree’. The swan formed a part of the private imagery Paul Nash and Eileen Agar shared in their letters and drawings to each other during their affair, hence his gifting of this watercolour to her. 

See https://gerrishfineart.com/product/comment-on-leda

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Corfe Castle from the Heath

Medium and dimensions: Chalk and watercolour, H 31.8 x W 42.5 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.831, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.18.

https://www.mutualart.com/Artwork/Corfe-Castle/31E7053D31B18F2E   

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Corfe Castle from the Heath

Medium and dimensions: Chalk and watercolour, H 27.3 x W 37.5 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.832, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.19.

Reproduced in the Dorset Shell Guide (1936), and the Bystander, 13 May 1936. Collection: Sir Beckwith Whitehouse, 1936.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Corn Field, Dorset

Medium and dimensions: No dimensions or other data available

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.833, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.20.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Dorset Coast

Medium and dimensions: Chalk and watercolour, H 28.6 x 38.7 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.834, p.431, plate 528.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.21.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Dorset Landscape

Medium and dimensions: Pencil, chalk and watercolour, H 39.4 x 57.2 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.835, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.22.

Date: c.1935

Title of artwork:

Empty Room

Medium and dimensions: Pencil, chalk and watercolour, H 38.1 x 55.9 cm

Inscribed on front, ‘Sketch of ‘Empty Room’ as long promised for Eileen, and on the reverse ‘and even now this is late, forgive. Posted February 14, 1938’. Labelled ‘e’ by Eileen Agar. TGA 8712/2/6

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.836, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.23.

Margot Eates, The Master of the Image 1889-1946 (London: John Murray, 1973) p.68, 69.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Fossils, shells, study

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 14.0 x 22.9 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.838, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.24.

Date: 1935 (?)

Title of artwork:

Hill Architecture

Medium and dimensions: Pencil, chalk and watercolour, H 28.5 x W 39.4 cm

References:

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) p.238.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.839, p.432.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.25.

Note: Paul Nash dated the picture ‘1937’: Margaret as ‘1935’. Paul was first at the site in 1935 and made three versions of the site from c.1937 and 1943.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Hilly Landscape

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour,

H 29.2 x W 39.4

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.840, p.432.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.26.

Causey notes that Margaret Nash had dated this 1931, but it is more likely to be drawn at the same time as another view of Badbury Rings (Denton 10, Causey 821), which it closely resembles.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Kimmeridge

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour with colour notes, H 26.7 x W 38.1 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.841, p.432.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.27.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Landscape at Whitecliff

Medium and dimensions: No further details available.

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.842, p.432.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.28.

This piece was exhibited at the Redfern Gallery exhibition in 1935.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Landscape, West Dorset

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 28.0 x W 38.1 cm

References:

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955)

p.238.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.843, p.432.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.29.

Reproduced from The Shell Guide to Dorset, 1936

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

No 2, The Parade

Medium and dimensions: Watercolour, H 28.0 x W 38.1 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.845, p.432, pl.530.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.30.

Margot Eates, The Master of the Image 1889-1946 (London: John Murray, 1973) p.61.

The title is the address in Swanage where Paul and Margaret Nash lived from February 1935 through that summer.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Object on the Sands

Medium and dimensions: Pencil, chalk and watercolour, H 17.8 x W 25.4 cm

References:

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) p.245.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.846, p.432.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.31.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Peveril

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 19.7 x W 28.5 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.847, p.432-3.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.32.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Pier

Medium and dimensions: Chalk and watercolour, H 25.4 x W 35.6 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.849, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.33.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Reef

Medium and dimensions: Watercolour, H 17.8 x W 29.2 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.850, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.34.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Rocks

Medium and dimensions: Watercolour. No further details available.

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.851, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.35.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Sea Birds

Medium and dimensions: Watercolour. No further details available.

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.852, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.36.

Date: c.1934/35  

Title of artwork:

Seaside 

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour on paper, 25.6 x 35.8 cm. 

References: 

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.853, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.37.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Sea Study

Medium and dimensions: Watercolour. No further details available.

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.854, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.38.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Sea Wall

Medium and dimensions: Pencil, chalk and watercolour on cream paper, H 38.1 x W 55.9 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.855, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.39.

Margot Eates, The Master of the Image 1889-1946 (London: John Murray, 1973) p.63, 64, pl.85.

Title of artwork:

Seaweed in Surf

Medium and dimensions: Watercolour, H 25.4 x W 35.6 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.856, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.40.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Sea Study

Medium and dimensions: Watercolour. No further details available.

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.854, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.38.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Shore scene with distant hills

Medium and dimensions: Chalk and watercolour on cream paper, H 17.8 x W 25.4 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.858, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.41.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Storm Sea, Swanage

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour on paper, H 28.0 x W 38.1 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.862, p.433.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.42.

Piano Nobile, Paul Nash, Watercolours 1919-1946, Another Life, Another World, 10 September – 22 November 2014.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Swanage

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 29.2 x W 39.4 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.863, p.434.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.43.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Swanage, Low Tide

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 38.1 x W 55.9 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.864, p.434.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.44.

Margot Eates (ed.), Paul Nash: Paintings, Drawings and Illustrations (London, 1948) p.52.

https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2020/refining-taste-works-selected-by-danny-katz/paul-nash-swanage-low-tide

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

The Tide

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 38.1 x W 55.9 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.865, p.434.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.44.

Margot Eates (ed.), Paul Nash: Paintings, Drawings and Illustrations (London, 1948) p.52.

Date: Probably 1935 (often dated 1937 or 1938, but it must be earlier as it was shown at the Redfern Gallery 1936, catalogue no.30.)

Title of artwork:

The Voyage of the Fungus

Medium and dimensions: Pencil, Chalk and watercolour, H 28.5 x W 39.4 cm

References:

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) p.245.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.868, p.434.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.46.

Margot Eates (ed.), Paul Nash: Paintings, Drawings and Illustrations (London, 1948) p.69, 84, pl.87 in colour.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Wave

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 40.6 x W 58.5 cm

References:

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.869, p.434.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.47.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:

Environment for Two Objects

Medium and dimensions: Oil, H 52.1 x W 77.5 cm

References:

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) p.245.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.877, p.435.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.48.

Margot Eates (ed.), Paul Nash: Paintings, Drawings and Illustrations (London, 1948) p.67, pl 81.

Date: 1936-38

Title of artwork:

Landscape from a Dream

Medium and dimensions: Oil, H 52.1 x W 77.5 cm

References:

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) p.247-8.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.879, p.436.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.49.

Margot Eates (ed.), Paul Nash: Paintings, Drawings and Illustrations (London, 1948) p.68, pl 89.

John Rothenstein, Modern English Painters, Volume Two: Lewis to Moore, (London: Eyre and Spottiswoode,1956) p.111.

Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Fredericton

Dated by the artist, by Margaret Nash and in the 1938 Leicester Galleries show as 1938, it was listed for show at Rosenberg & Helft as January 1937 (no.4). The Tate Gallery date of 1936-8 is clearly the correct one (Causey, 1980, p.436).

--------------------------------------------

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:  

No 2, The Parade 

Medium and dimensions: Watercolour, H 28.0 x W 38.1 cm

References: 

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.845, p.432, pl.530.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.30.

Margot Eates, The Master of the Image 1889-1946 (London: John Murray, 1973) p.61.

 This is the address in Swanage where Paul and Margaret Nash lived from February 1935 through that summer. 

---------------------------

1935

Chalk Cliffs, from Swanage to Old Harry Rocks 

Medium and dimensions: Pencil and watercolour, H 12.0 x W 19.0 cm

References: 

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.828, p.431.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.16.

Photographed from the Dorset Shell Guide (1936) for which it was specifically created.

Date: 1935

Title of artwork:  

Environment for Two Objects  

Medium and dimensions: Oil, H 52.1 x W 77.5 cm

References: 

Anthony Bertram, Paul Nash, the Portrait of an Artist (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) p.245.

Andrew Causey, Paul Nash Catalogue Raisonné, Oxford University Press, 1980), cat. no.877, p.435.

Penny Denton, ‘Seaside Surrealism’ Paul Nash in Swanage (Durlstone, 2002) cat.48.

Margot Eates (ed.), Paul Nash: Paintings, Drawings and Illustrations (London, 1948) p.67, pl 81.