Skip to main content
Lot 54AR

John Craxton R.A.
(British, 1922-2009)
Fisherman and boy 20.9 x 22.8 cm. (8 1/4 x 9 in.)

29 May 2013, 14:00 BST
London, New Bond Street

Sold for £16,250 inc. premium

Own a similar item?

Submit your item online for a free auction estimate.

How to sell

Looking for a similar item?

Our Modern British & Irish Art specialists can help you find a similar item at an auction or via a private sale.

Find your local specialist

Ask about this lot

John Craxton R.A. (British, 1922-2009)

Fisherman and boy
signed and dated 'Craxton/42' (lower right) and inscribed 'for Nick with love.' (lower centre)
pencil and crayon on card
20.9 x 22.8 cm. (8 1/4 x 9 in.)

Footnotes

PROVENANCE:
Gifted by the artist to the present owner circa 1980s

In 1942 John Craxton, turning 20 that autumn, was in full flow as an innovative artist – working in London with Lucian Freud and in Dorset with E.Q. Nicholson, and being mentored by Peter Watson and Graham Sutherland. Always dazzling, his drawings of this period were at their most surreal, often bearing oblique war-time metaphors. This benign image relates to a kraken series in which Craxton, punning on his name, created alienated and sometimes monstrous figures. He loved metamorphosis and his fluid marine forms would finally surface as a big-eyed, ink-loaded cuttlefish on the cover of the 1944 anthology Visionary Poems and Passages or The Poet's Eye.

We are grateful to Ian Collins for compiling this catalogue entry.

Additional information

Bid now on these items

Jessica Dismorr(British, 1885-1939)Self Portrait 55.4 x 40.1 cm. (21 3/4 x 15 3/4 in.)

Vanessa Bell(British, 1879-1961)Church of the Redentore, Venice 38.3 x 55.9 cm. (15 x 22 in.)

Dame Elisabeth Frink R.A.(British, 1930-1993)Warrior (Small Warrior) 36.4 cm. (14 3/8 in.) high

Winifred Nicholson(British, 1893-1981)Flowers - Sutton Veny 76.2 x 68.6 cm. (30 x 27 in.)

Laurence Stephen Lowry R.A.(British, 1887-1976)People at the Beach 31.3 x 40.4 cm. (12 3/8 x 16 1/8 in.)

Laurence Stephen Lowry R.A.(British, 1887-1976)Five Figures 26.5 x 18.2 cm. (10 3/8 x 7 1/4 in.)