Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson (1889-1946)

Loading Timber at Southampton Docks

Nevinson studied at the Slade with an incredibly talented generation that included Paul Nash, Ben Nicholson, Mark Gertler and Stanley Spencer. After his teacher Henry Tonks told him to give up any idea of becoming an artist he went to study in Paris. In 1914 he joined Marinetti in trying to found an English Futurist group but succeeded only in falling out with his fellow modernist artists.

During the First World War Nevinson served as an ambulance driver. This gave him first-hand experience of the horrors of modern warfare but also inspired some of his most powerful work. He was later appointed an Official War Artist and passed through Southampton on his way to France. This dynamic painting shows the influence of Futurism and Cubism on Nevinson's art with its emphasis on geometric shapes and patterns, machinery and movement.

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