frank dobson · sculptor - thefineartsociety.com · dobson enthusiastically for his ability to...

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The Fine Art Societyin association with Gillian Jason-./0./·2012

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In an extended interview with the writer and academic Stanley Casson broadcast by the 334 in 1933 Frank Dobson set out his intentions and ideas concerning his sculpture. ‘The primary appeal of sculpture’, Dobson declared, ‘is to the emotion which results from contemplating the peculiar and apparently static evolutions which take place when a number of forms are superbly assembled’. Questioned by Casson about what he meant by this, Dobson expanded further:

All the !nest works of sculpture which I have seen have a peculiar still quality, which I call static. Underlying this, the forms … or the multiple of them, are assembled in such a fashion that one is aware of a continuous and beautiful movement within the whole which I like to call rhythm. One limb is given a fullness which leads up to another shape …5

Dobson apologised that it was di6cult to de7ne something which he struggled precisely to put into words. But moreover that it was exactly this need to represent some inde7nable emotion, which stood outside the strictures of spoken language – and summoned by the rhythmic relation of sculpted forms one to another – which made him a sculptor. This ability of expression and form to contain and commu-nicate abstract emotion was a key foundation of modernist theory. In Britain it had been largely what Clive Bell had de7ned in his important critical thesis Art published in 1914. Here the term Bell applied to the experience Dobson described was ‘aesthetic emotion’, which was aroused in the viewer by ‘signi7-cant form’. Bell believed that the success of a work of

art had nothing to do with its relation to the accuracy of what it portrayed but instead only the truthfulness of its emotive potential. Bell also suggested that artists experienced the world in a particular way by seeing it in terms of pure forms, and that it was the communication of this abstraction from the ordi-nary that was an end in itself. Dobson told Casson that he himself would reduce a subject to its planar constituents: the artist ‘looks at Nature, whether it be the human 7gure, a landscape or anything else and cuts out what he thinks are unnecessary bumps and holes. So that in the end he has a number of simpli7ed shapes, which present his conception … The artist puts these planes together so that they produce such harmony or discord as he requires for his work when it is completed.’8 Dobson’s working practice was however initially abstract rather than rooted in nature or observation. He described to Casson how he would 7rst make a small maque9e in clay or wax ‘roughly, without detail’, and then ‘having found the form’ set a life model in that pose and make ‘hundreds of drawings’ on which to base the 7nal sculpture.:

Dobson went on to further echo Bell’s concepts in his answer to the question of how are we to de7ne sculpture. ‘That’s a real poser’, Dobson answered frankly, but went on:

Take two or more shapes – say an egg and a matchbox – and place them together in relation as things in three dimensions. If these forms, even the egg and the matchbox, are so arranged and assembled that they produce beauty – and I don’t mean physical beauty – then that result is sculp-ture … There need be no sort of representation involved at all. The shapes alone are enough.;

Interestingly, Dobson’s description of the beauty Dancers 1919, polished bronze,height 16 inches / 41 cm, Private Collection [cat.1]

FRANK DOBSON: ‘TRUE SCULPTURE AND PURE SCULPTURE’

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to o=er an example of how to achieve some greater emotional connection, somewhat of the type Clive Bell had discussed in relation to ‘aesthetic emotion’. In his 334 interview Dobson speci7cally praised ‘three or four hundred pieces of perfectly superb sculpture’ made in the Congo, and o=ered the belief that their special signi7cance within tribal culture might be repeated by ‘the ordinary man’ because ‘without preconceived notions, there is no reason why any one of us … should not derive joy and satisfaction from looking at a good piece of sculp-ture.’> In 1927 the dealer Sydney Burney mounted an exhibition that showed African carvings along-side Dobson’s sculpture, and also that of Jacob Epstein, Barbara Hepworth, John Skeaping and Ossip Zadkine.

Dobson’s trips to Paris took him into the orbit of other advanced European artists. He visited Man Ray to borrow a 7lm to screen in London, and he was on friendly terms with Zadkine and André Derain who both invited him to their studios, and he visited Maillol. In the mid-1920s Dobson was photographed in the company of Constantin Brancusi, ?anked by Augustus John, and in Dobson’s First Portrait of Mary (1926, Tate) there appears to be some formal debt to the slanting head of Brancusi’s famous Sleeping Muse (1913, @.@A).

Dobson was, with Epstein, the best known British sculptor of the 1920s and 1930s and highly critically regarded. It is evident he was admired by younger

sculptors 7nding their own voice. In the 1930s the boundaries of British sculpture’s potential were pushed by Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore. Their originality was rightly recognised, but in their formative work both evidently had an awareness of Dobson’s aesthetic. Hepworth’s carved Hoptonwood stone Torso of 1928 (Tate) or Mother and Child (1927, Art Gallery of Ontario) are both subjects and treat-ments that suggest an intimate knowledge and absorption of Dobson’s carvings. Moore’s reclining 7gures with their powerful and exaggerated limbs take further something voiced 7rst in Dobson’s studies of the nude. Like Dobson, Moore found inspiration in the antique sculptures he studied in the British Museum and had a deep interest in tribal carv-ings. And Moore was evidently well disposed towards Dobson. When Derwent Wood suddenly resigned his position as head of the sculpture school at the Royal College of Art in 1925 the Principal William Rothenstein appointed Moore to take over tempo-rarily. Moore suggested the permanent appointment be given to Dobson, as Britain’s leading sculptor, but he was ignored by Rothenstein who considered Dobson an ‘unsafe’ in?uence, presumably because of his status and style.B But this recommendation demonstrates Moore’s high regard for Dobson’s work and his capability, and his familiarity with him as a sculptor. When Moore, now feted as Britain’s greatest sculptor, came to select the sculpture for the Festival of Britain in 1951, he chose Dobson’s monumental 7gure group London Pride which was shown in a pavillion alongside work by Moore himself, Barbara Hepworth, Jacob Epstein, Reg Butler and Lynn Chadwick. Moore brought together all the repre-sentatives of modern British sculpture he valued the most and demonstrated the continuity and strength of modern British sculptural expression of which Dobson had played such a key part.

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contained in the relation between an egg and box shaped object is highly reminiscent of sculptures Barbara Hepworth was just beginning to make around this time, such as Two Forms (private collec-tion, 1934) which consist of relational abstract elements placed on a de7ned 7eld. She herself was engaging with the commitment to pure abstract geometric forms in the art of the Abstraction-Création association of artists, founded by Theo van Doesburg and Jean Hélion in Paris as a rebu9al to a new popularity for 7guration.

Although in his interview Dobson apparently championed a claim for true abstraction – ‘there need be no representation at all. The shapes alone are enough’ – he went on to suggest that for him, or in his view, the human 7gure remained at the heart of sculptural inspiration:

The actual human form is the only source of inspi-ration in the long run. Even animal forms are unsat-isfactory … When you use the human form you are using something with which you are intimate and familiar. You !nd new shapes the more you study it. The mere representation of a physical form or the idea of it isn’t satisfying. You must reassemble, as it were, the parts of a known body … and what is reassembled must have some a"nity with a human form. But what you make may be a variation of the human shape – that is to say, the artist need not be mathematically accurate.G

Dobson was of the generation of British moderns who came to prominence on the eve of the First World War, and who formed the 7rst wave of Britain’s response to advanced Continental art. In the 1920s he was exhibited alongside Gaudier-Brzeska, the pioneer of so-called ‘primitive’ sculpture who had been killed in the war in 1915 and these were the two sculptors chosen to represent Britain at the 1924 Venice Biennale. Wyndham Lewis explicitly claimed Dobson as the heir to the French sculptor’s mantle when he invited him to exhibit as part of Group X, the avant-garde group he formed in 1920 in a failed a9empt to revive Vorticism. Roger Fry praised Dobson enthusiastically for his ability to produce ‘true sculpture and pure sculpture, and that this is almost the 7rst time that such a thing has been a9empted in England.’H

Together with Jacob Epstein, Dobson was the most consistently advanced sculptor working in Britain in the 1920s albeit expressing himself within a 7gurative idiom. In the wake of the War and in an atmosphere of national mourning which was distrustful of the avant-garde, any appetite for Vorticist abstraction had dissipated. Even Lewis switched to 7guration of a modern, planar character and Epstein too retreated from the stylisation of his pre-War work towards a sculptural style that was based on closer observation of the 7gure, and he became somewhat critical of abstraction. But in this shiI they all were following developments across the Channel, where in Paris Picasso had long abandoned Cubist abstraction in favour of a modern reworking of Classicism.

Dobson was directly acquainted with develop-ments among the Paris avant-garde, and his accept-ance of Picasso is a particularly important context within which to consider his work at this time. The monumental solidity and exaggeratedly powerful limbs of many of Dobson’s 7gures owe much to the impact of Picasso and paintings such as the famous Two Women Running on a Beach (1922, Musée Picasso, Paris) or La Source (1921, Moderna Museet, Stockholm). In 1924 Dobson famously made a bust of Picasso’s great friend and inspiration, the ballerina Lydia Lopokova, who was Nijinski’s dancing partner and the star of Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. Dobson made the 7rst of many visits to Paris in 1922 where he would become familiar with advanced art of this period. On this 7rst trip he visited the gallery of Picasso’s dealer Paul Rosenburg, where there was an exhibition of Picasso’s paintings of bathers which would have a lasting e=ect on his art.

Dobson also made a visit to the Trocadero in order to see the collection of African art. There was considerable interest in both Paris and London in what was considered the unfe9ered immediacy and raw emotional strength of such tribal objects. Like Epstein, who formed his own collection of tribal 7gures, Dobson was greatly in?uenced by African carvings which simpli7ed or exaggerated elements of the 7gure. What was termed at the time the ‘primi-tive’ quality of such tribal art works was believed by many advanced artists from Picasso to Modigliani

leI to right: Augustus John, Constantin Brancusi and Frank Dobson c.1925 (National Portrait Gallery)

1 Stanley Casson, Artists at Work, Harrap, London, 1933 p.472 Ibid. p.383 Ibid. p.354 Ibid. p.325 Ibid. pp.32–33

6 Roger Fry, ‘Mr Dobson’s Sculpture’, The Burlington Magazine, vol.+-J , 1925, pp.171–77 Casson, p.528 William Rothenstein, Men and Memories, J J , Faber & Faber, London, 1932, p.196

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Frank Dobson was born in Acton Street, St Pancras, London on 18 November 1886. His father was a commercial artist, and young Frank was introduced to the technical aspects of painting at an early age. His father also fostered in him a love and respect for 7ne art by taking him on frequent visits to the National Gallery.

At the age of eleven he won an art scholarship to Leyton Technical School, where he began to be critical of the commercial art practised by his father. As he wrote: I realised that what my father was doing was just hack repetition. And there was a kind of art that could be done once and once only …

AIer leaving school in 1901 at the age of four-teen, Dobson took a series of uncongenial jobs before becoming an assistant to the sculptor William Reynolds-Stephens, then President of the Royal Society of Sculptors. Although at that time he had no ambition to become a sculptor, the year and a half spent in Reynolds-Stephens’ studio gave him a knowledge of the techniques required for sculpture and a profound respect for craIsmanship.

During a period spent in Cornwall, 7nancial hard-ship obliged him to resort to his father’s despised method of churning out potboilers to make a living. When a friend told him that scholarships were being o=ered at Hospital7eld Art School in Arbroath, Scotland, he applied and was o=ered a place. The four years spent at Hospital7eld proved to be the most formative period of his life. AIer the time he had spent alone, struggling to earn a living from his art, he was delighted to 7nd himself in the company of like-minded fellow students.

However he was disappointed in the old-fashioned methods of his teachers and spent his time out of classes working on his own, copying drawings of the old masters from reproductions. What particularly intrigued him in these drawings was the way form was created, and this interest in shape and volume was to lay the foundations for his future development as a sculptor.

AIer graduating from Hospital7eld in 1910, Dobson returned to London and enrolled in the City and Guilds School. The school encouraged students to apply their talents as broadly as possible, and to move from one discipline to another. This approach was to give Dobson his 7rst opportunity of creating sculpture. But deprived of the comfortable accom-modation provided at Hospital7eld, he found himself once again forced to earn su6cient to keep himself during his studies, and took a job cu9ing out metal le9ers for tramcar advertisements.

Despite the hardship he was experiencing, being in London at this time a=orded him a life-changing opportunity. From 8 November 1910 to 15 January 1911, Roger Fry mounted his landmark exhibition, Manet and the Post-Impressionists at the GraIon Galleries, which brought to the English public for the 7rst time the ‘modernist’ art which was being created in France.

It is di6cult now to enter the mind-set of those who were so deeply shocked by the work of such artists as Manet, Gauguin, Van Gogh and Matisse, but at the time the reaction of the public, and the debate among artists was furious. The sculptor Eric Gill wrote in a le9er: All the critics are tearing one another’s eyes out over it and the sheep and the goats are inextricably mixed up. (Augustus) John says ‘it’s a bloody show’ & Lady O#oline says ‘oh

Detail of Bather 1943, bronze with dark green patina,height 7K inches / 19 cm [cat.11]

FRANK DOBSON: SCULPTOR !""#$!%#&

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Dobson was an intimate in the Nicholson family circle, a friend of both Sir William Nicholson and his son the artist Ben Nicholson. An admirer of Dobson’s work, Ben acknowledged Dobson’s in?uence during his early years, citing him and David Bomberg as the only two artists then working who had a ‘universal outlook’.

The 1920s were heady times for Dobson. He found himself championed by the most in?uential critics of the avant-garde Roger Fry and Clive Bell, exhibiting with the London Group and with the Friday Club, Vanessa Bell’s weekly soiree in Gordon Square. Clive Bell wrote an article in Vogue relating the work of Dobson and Epstein to that of Bernini. He and Cordelia were invited for lavish week-end parties given by Asquith and his wife Margot, and to the country house of David Garne9. These outings to grand houses were in stark contrast to the home life

of ‘Dobbie’ and Cordelia, who were living in his studio in Manresa Road, Chelsea without a bathroom, obliged to use the Public Baths for their ablutions.

Dobson, like Epstein and other sculptors of the time relied for his living on portrait busts, and his growing reputation brought him such distinguished si9ers as H.H. Asquith, Osbert Sitwell, the American author Robert McAlmon, historical novelist Leo H. Myers, the actress Tallulah Bankhead, and ballerina Lydia Lopokova, wife of Maynard Keynes.

One of their neighbours in Manresa Road, and a regular visitor to Dobson’s studio was T.E. Lawrence. Lawrence became fascinated by the process of sculpture, and purchased a cast of Dobson’s Head of Osbert Sitwell [no.2] which he described as … the

Dobson in his studio at Manresa Road with Cecil Beaton and plaster, c.1930(Henry Moore Institute Archive)

charming’, Fry says ‘what rhythm’ & McColl says ‘what rot’ …

Dobson later wrote of his response: The show at the Gra$on Galleries was just an explosion – the demolition of all the art forms I had come to know. I was a%ronted, even hurt. But what a vista! Anything was possible. Here was something more than just emotion. Here was work for the intelligence.

Poverty again drove Dobson down to Cornwall, where he knew he could make some sort of a living by painting pot-boilers as before. However he was deter-mined to continue his studies, and managed to 7nd su6cient funds to study part-time with the painter Stanhope Forbes. But he found himself forced back into the old-fashioned a9itudes and techniques he had revolted against at Hospital7eld, and soon parted company with Forbes.

That year chance was to favour him. Augustus John and his beautiful wife Dorelia caused consider-able excitement among the artistic community when they arrived to stay in Newlyn. Alfred Munnings, whose acquaintance Dobson had already made, introduced Dobson to John, and Dobson invited John to his studio to see his work. John was su6ciently impressed to suggest an exhibition at the Chenil Galleries in London’s King’s Road, where he had his studio, and exercised considerable in?uence over the choice of artists.

This exhibition in 1913 was to bring Dobson his 7rst measure of success, and the interest of a patron, Edward Marsh, private secretary to Winston Churchill. Marsh was a passionate collector and supporter of young artists and his patronage was to prove invalu-able to Dobson in future periods of 7nancial hardship.

On returning to Newlyn, Dobson began to experi-ment with creating sculpture. Having been impressed by Gauguin’s carvings in Fry’s exhibition, he began to carve pieces in wood and stone. He was excited by the possibilities opened up by his exposure to African and Oceanic art, 7nding a new freedom to ignore literal representation. His aim was to create a pure sculpture, true to the material in which it was made. This involved direct carving rather than modelling, as a means of breaking away from the sculpture of the past.

In 1914 war was declared and this period of creative

experiment was forced to end. Dobson enlisted in the Artists’ Ri?es and saw action on the front line at the ba9le of the Somme. He was injured in an explosion, sent back to England su=ering from shell-shock, and spent an extended period of convalescence in London. On enlisting he had leI his sweetheart, Cordelia Tregurtha behind in Cornwall, and they now took the opportunity to marry. He applied to become a War Artist, and although he failed to achieve an o6-cial appointment, in 1919 he was o=ered a commis-sion to produce a painting of The Balloon Apron in Canvey Island, (now in the Imperial War Museum).

Wyndham Lewis, self appointed leader of the British avant-garde movement, had become acquainted with Dobson before the war and admired his work. In March 1920 he organised an exhibition at Heals’ Mansard Gallery in London. For this exhibi-tion he invited a number of artists including Dobson to take part, inventing a cohesive title for them, ‘Group X’.

For Dobson, a practically unknown painter, totally unknown as a sculptor, this was a signi7cant opportunity. He found himself exhibiting alongside artists who had already made a reputation: Charles Ginner, Cuthbert Hamilton, William Roberts, Edward Wadsworth, Jessica Dismorr, Frederick Etchells, John Turnbull, Edward McKnight Kau=er and Lewis himself.

Dobson’s association with Wyndham Lewis was to bring him into contact with many of the most important 7gures of the day in literature, society and the arts, among them T.S. Eliot, Osbert, Edith and Sacheverell Sitwell, Eugene Goossens, Maynard Keynes, H.H. Asquith, Clive and Vanessa Bell, Leonard and Virginia Woolf, Ly9on Strachey and Duncan Grant.

Following the Group X exhibition, he was invited to exhibit sculpture and drawings at the Leicester Galleries together with paintings by Albert Rutherston and drawings by J.F. Millet. This exhibi-tion included the stone carving The Man Child (now in the Victoria and Albert Museum) and busts of the daughters of Leo H Myers, one of which is shown in this exhibition, that of Elsie Queen Myers, who was later to become the wife of Ben Nicholson’s brother Kit.

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!nest portrait bust of modern times … appropriate, authentic, and magni!cent in my eyes, I think it’s his !nest piece of portraiture and in addition it’s as loud as the massed band of the Guards.

The Sitwell siblings, Osbert, Edith and Sacheverell, all giIed writers, were at the forefront of the English modern movement in the arts, enthu-siastically discovering and fostering new talent. One of their most talented protégés was the young composer William Walton. Together with Edith, Walton created a theatrical entertainment, Façade, combining his music with Edith’s poetry. Façade was probably inspired by Jean Cocteau’s Parade which had recently been seen in Paris with designs by Picasso. The performances of Façade, 7rst in Sitwell’s home and subsequently at the Aeolian Hall in Bond Street, featured a front cloth painted with a Greek-style mask by Dobson, through the open mouth of which Edith recited her poetry with the aid of a megaphone. The piece divided the audience between those who applauded its originality and those who were shocked by its unconventionality. Noel Coward, more amused than shocked, wrote a wicked parody of the production, lampooning the Sitwells as ‘The Swiss Family Whi9lebot’.

AIer the First World War Paris was restored to its position of pre-eminence in the arts and during the 1920s was a magnet for artists from all over the world. In 1922 Dobson made his 7rst visit there in the company of Stephen Tomlin, whom he had taken on as his pupil. They ran into Wyndham Lewis and Charles Rutherston who took them to see James Joyce. They also met Ezra Pound, who had champi-oned the sculptor Gaudier-Brzeska before the war. Pound introduced Dobson to Ernest Hemingway, and embarrassed him by describing him as ‘the saviour of sculpture in England’. They visited the galleries and Dobson was impressed by the paintings of Bonnard, the canvases of massive nude bathers by Picasso and the simpli7cation of form in the African sculpture exhibited at the Trocadero.

In 1924 two sculptors were chosen to represent Britain at the Venice Biennale, Frank Dobson and Henri Gaudier-Brzeska who although French, had spent his artistic life in England before his tragically early death in ba9le in 1915. Dobson’s visit to Italy

gave him the chance to see at 7rst hand works by some of the great masters he had always admired.

The following year his friend the author Leo Myers, a man of means, invited Dobson to accom-pany him on a visit to Ceylon. The impressions of all he saw in the East stimulated his creativity, and on returning he set to work on a large stone carving, Cornucopia [cat.34], which became the

Cornucopia 1925–27, Ham Hill stone, height 42K inches / 108 cm, The University of Hull Art Collection [cat.33]

opposite: Dobson in his Bristol studio working on Persephone, c.1940 (Henry Moore Institute Archive)

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to raise industrial design standards by employing contemporary artists. Dobson cut the lino blocks, and he and Mary printed them onto fabric by hand. These are now in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum.

As the Fascist threat to Europe became more menacing, liberal minded artists banded together to form The Artists’ International Association, and in 1939 Dobson took part in their exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery. That same year war was declared and Dobson, concerned for the safety of his family, decided to close his Chelsea studio and move out of London. His choice of Bristol as a place of retreat was no doubt motivated by the o=er there of a major retrospective exhibition. This was the largest retrospective of his lifetime, although one major piece he would have wanted to show, the large

stone carving Pax, had been sent to New York for the World’s Fair, and was not available.

But Bristol was to prove a far from safe desti-nation. As a port it was an obvious target for the LuIwa=e. The air raids when they came were 7erce, and although Dobson was able to produce some vivid drawings of the city’s buildings on 7re, Mary’s nerves were badly a=ected by the bombing, and by the end of the year they were obliged to move again, this time to the peaceful countryside of Borden in Hampshire.

Dobson was to have taken part again in the Venice Biennale, but Britain had withdrawn once Italy joined forces with Germany. His sculptures, which had

centrepiece of his one-man show at the Leicester Galleries in 1927. This exhibition brought him the most resounding critical accolades of his career. Clive Bell wrote of Cornucopia: Here, dominating the gallery, is his masterpiece which, in my opinion, is the !nest piece of sculpture that has been produced by an Englishman since – since I don’t know when. For Roger Fry, Dobson’s work exempli7ed his theory of ‘pure’ sculpture: … whether we like his work or not, we must admit that it is true sculpture and pure sculpture, and that this is almost the !rst time that such a thing has been even a#empted in England.

In 1925, economist Maynard Keynes and industri-alist Samuel Courtauld decided that artists needed an organisation which would provide them with a modest but guaranteed income, and together with two other wealthy art collectors they founded The London Artists’ Association. Members included Dobson, Vanessa Bell, Duncan Grant and William Roberts. But the defection of artists who saw a be9er future with powerful galleries damaged the Association, and eventually brought it to an end.

In 1926 Dobson was again an exhibitor at the Venice Biennale. This time he was also on the selec-tion commi9ee, and at the opening of the exhibition escorted the King of Italy around the British Pavilion. His work was given further international exposure that year in an exhibition which toured the E(A and Canada.

For some time Dobson’s marriage to Cordelia had been in trouble, and his meeting with a young woman called Mary Bussell was to bring it to an end. He and Mary spent the summer that year in the South of France and then moved to Paris for the winter, where they were befriended by the American artist Man Ray and his partner Kiki de Montparnasse. Dobson took the opportunity to visit the studios of two sculptors he admired, Osip Zadkine and Aristide Maillol.

His next exhibition in London at the Leicester Galleries was his most ambitious to date, and he later described it as ‘the show which 7nally established me.’ He was now forty-one, and at the height of his fame. Among the artists who arrived at his Chelsea studio to ask his opinion of their work was the young Christopher Wood, who had been living in Paris and encouraged in his painting by Cocteau and Picasso.

Wood wrote to his mother telling her of his impending visit to Dobson: He is a sculptor, perhaps the best in England and certainly a great authority.’

In 1928 a daughter, Ann, was born to Frank and Mary, and needing more space, they took an addi-tional studio next door. Because Dobson was still legally married to Cordelia, they were not able to marry until two years later.

1930 saw Dobson exhibiting at the Zwemmer Gallery in company with Epstein, Moore and Gaudier-Brzeska. The critic R.H. Wilenski wrote that Dobson’s work is concerned with the plastic play and interplay of subtly de!ned masses. That year the Society of Industrial Artists was established, with Dobson as a founder member. He also received the only important architectural commission of his career, to provide the gilded faience decorations for the new art deco building, Hays Wharf, which fronts onto the Thames, across the river from Cannon Street Station.

Dobson’s sculpture, Truth, a monumental bronze nude 7gure, was 7rst shown at the Leicester Galleries and later purchased for the nation by public subscription. It was installed in the gardens outside the Tate Gallery in 1931 and remained there until 1939, when it went into store for the duration of the war. It only recently emerged, and was until recently on view in the main concourse of Tate Britain.

Although Dobson continued to produce portrait busts, the theme which had established itself 7rmly in his work was the female nude, on which he was to create endless inventive variations. In 1933 an acci-dent leI him with only limited ability to raise his leI arm, which made carving nearly impossible, and from this time almost all his work was to be modelled.

In 1936 the Dutch Government mounted an exhibition of British art in which Dobson was repre-sented with Epstein and Moore. The Coronation of King George MJ and Queen Elizabeth was to take place that summer, and Dobson was commissioned to design a piece of silver for presentation to the new King and Queen. The result, a silver-gilt chalice called Calix Majestatis, is permanently held in Holyrood House, Edinburgh.

Dobson’s ability to turn his hand to new challenges was again called upon when he was commissioned to produce textile designs for a company a9empting

The Manresa Road studio aIer bombing, showing Lady Dorothy Ashley-Cooper [cat.9](Henry Moore Institute Archive)

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already been packed ready for transport, were exhib-ited instead, along with the works of the 7ve other British artists involved, at Hertford House in London, now home of the Wallace Collection.

Times were hard 7nancially, and Dobson approached the War Artists’ Advisory Commi9ee, looking for commissions. The commi9ee purchased several drawings, and commissioned two portrait busts of Navy personnel, one of which, Admiral Sir William Melbourne James &'( [cat.28], is shown in the present exhibition. At an early stage in the si9ings the un7nished bust was almost completely destroyed when a bomb fell on the Admiralty, but Dobson managed with di6culty to remodel the damaged remains.

In 1942 he was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy, which he accepted, despite his previous criticisms of that institution, then considered old-fashioned and a bastion of anti-modernism. Two years later in 1944 he showed once again at the Leicester Galleries, exhibiting sculpture and draw-ings. The show was well received, and one critic remarked on a link between Dobson’s 7gures and Picasso’s monumental nudes, an interesting obser-vation in view of the paintings by Picasso which Dobson had admired in Paris in the ‘twenties.

That year he was invited to judge the students’ sculpture at Glasgow School of Art, and used the opportunity to work on a commission from the War Artists’ Commi9ee to make drawings of shipbuilding subjects. At the same time, two of his sculptures were shown at the Glasgow Institute.

When the war ended Dobson and Mary were anxious to move back to London. His old studio in Manresa Road, Chelsea, had been bombed during the war, and much of the work he had leI there either destroyed or looted. They found a house in Harley Gardens, Kensington with a studio a9ached and moved in that winter. At the age of sixty he was once again faced with the necessity of re-adjusting to peacetime conditions, as he had been before in 1918.

One post-war project of which he had hopes was never to be realised. Building had started on the new Waterloo Bridge in 1939 and had been completed during the war. There were plans to place sculptures at either end of the bridge, and Dobson, together

with Epstein, Moore, Hepworth, Kennington and Wheeler were invited to submit designs. Dobson’s were based on Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms, studies for two of which, Freedom from Fear [cat.20] and Freedom from Want [cat.21], are shown in this exhibi-tion. It was a great disappointment when in the end the decision was taken to leave the bridge unadorned.

Collectors and portrait commissions were thin on the ground in the post-war period, and Dobson was 7nding it di6cult to maintain himself and his family. Happily a solution to the problem arrived when in 1946 the post of Professor of Sculpture at the Royal College of Art became available. Dobson’s name was put forward by Henry Moore, who had always admired his work, and he was appointed on a 7ve year contract.

AIer the war years in which young artists had been unable to follow their ambitions, obliged to serve in the armed forces or to take jobs in factories, the students Dobson found at the Royal College were full of enthusiasm and eager to learn. However he was concerned to 7nd that although life-drawing classes were held at the Victoria and Albert Museum, hardly anybody a9ended them, and his 7rst act was to institute life classes within the Sculpture School. He proved to be a popular teacher, and his years at the Royal College were some of the most contented of his life.

In 1947 Dobson was awarded the 43D , and his drawings and watercolours were shown by the British Council at the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Albertina Gallery, Vienna, and in Australia and Canada.

During the summer of 1948 there was a large outdoor exhibition of international sculpture in Ba9ersea Park intended to increase awareness of the possibilities for siting works in the open air, and Dobson was among the thirty-7ve British and European sculptors who took part.

To mark the hundredth anniversary of The Great Exhibition of 1851, a huge patriotic celebration, The Festival of Britain, was mounted in 1951 on London’s

Head Study for ‘Pax’, 1933, bronze, height 20 inches / 51 cm, The Royal Academy of Arts, London, Diploma Collection [cat.8]

!" ‘ T R U E S C U L P T U R E A N D P U R E S C U L P T U R E ’

their toll. He and Mary visited a friend’s villa on Lake Garda in Italy in the hope that the warmth and sun would help him recover, but the trip failed to bring the wished-for improvement, and he continued steadily to decline. In 1963 he was cheered by the o=er of an exhibition at the Redfern Gallery the following year, but it was never to take place. In February he under-went an exploratory operation which further debili-tated him, and 7ve months later he was re – admi9ed to the Princess Beatrice Hospital in Fulham, where he died on 22 July 1963.

By this time the reputation of Frank Dobson, who had been a leading member of the early school of British modernism, had been gradually overtaken by Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth and a host of up-and-coming young sculptors. But as the critic Francis Watson wrote to Mary, I never saw a !ne artist less bothered than Frank lest he should be forgo#en in the advance of younger men.

South Bank, intended to raise national pride and to show the country’s achievements in the arts and sciences. All the most respected British artists were commissioned to decorate the Pavilions or to exhibit work. Dobson’s monumental bronze, London Pride, stands today outside the National Theatre, then not built, only yards away from where it stood during the Festival.

In 1953 Dobson was elected CA , and deposited as his Diploma Work, the large bronze head, Study for ‘Pax’. His contract with the Royal College expired, but he had an exciting commission to look forward to, a posthumous portrait bust of the British-born American industrialist, Thomas Lipton. This involved Dobson’s 7rst visit to the United States, and in New York he and Mary were treated like celebrities. His

bust was unveiled at Wildenstein’s Gallery, and was well received by the press. The visit brought two other commissions, a portrait bust of the Chairman of Steuben Glass, and an invitation to design a piece for the company’s collection of artists’ glass. The result, an engraved goblet titled The Wave, is in the Steuben Collection.

In 1954 The Leicester Galleries held his eighth one-man exhibition. He continued to receive inter-esting commissions, including the clock-face on Albert Richardson’s Bracken House in Cannon Street and the statue9e for the Evening Standard Drama Awards. He and Mary decided to move to the country but they were not happy out of London, and Dobson was relieved to be o=ered one of the newly-built artists’ studios at Stamford Bridge.

By 1960 it became clear that his health was failing. Many years of smoking and inhaling stone dust and the sulphur fumes of the studio stove had taken

Dobson in the studio with the bronze of Susanna, c.1922–24 (Henry Moore Institute Archive)

Despite the vagaries of fashion, talent will always re-surface, and Dobson is not forgo9en. In the current artistic environment where it seems neces-sary to create a great noise to be heard, the eternal qualities of his tranquil art are still here to be appre-ciated. Duncan Grant referred to Frank Dobson as a sculptor of immense integrity and vision, with a feeling for the female form that seemed to wrest it out of the earth and make its very earthiness not only monumental, but sublime. I would call him a great sculptor; certainly one of England’s greatest.

Whether members of the present generation of artists, newly introduced to Dobson’s work, would agree with this assessment or not, it may lead them to ponder on the fragility of fashion in art, and to regret the neglect in recent years of so remarkable an artist.

/DMJ--D )A(./

,L B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N ,!

1 &#$.,") 1919 2 )-" ')(,"* )-*3,11 1922

Polished bronze, height 12K inches / 32cm

DF 2/2, from the original plaster; the Dobson Estate. An edition was not cast in Dobson’s lifetime.

FC.MD/A/4D : For original casts (1) the artist; T.E.Lawrence, 1922; loaned to the Tate 1923; his executors presented the work to the Tate in accordance with Lawrence’s wishes, 1950; (2) the si9er. For plasters: the artist; Mr & Mrs Baron; Christie’s 23.11.1993; Gillian Jason Gallery; National Portrait Gallery, 1994.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Venice Biennale, (the British Pavilion), 1928, no.32. (1); Arts Council of Great Britain, Memorial 1966, (14) (1) pl..8; Ke9les Yard, 1981, (32) (1); Courtauld Institute Galleries, Frank Dobson, Selected Sculpture 1915–1954, 1995, (12) (1), on loan from the Tate; Jason & Rhodes, London, 1994, Frank Dobson, Sculpture and Drawings. no.1/6 of a new edition (with 2 A/F casts), Dobson Estate and Gillian Jason Gallery. 2/6, National Portrait Gallery, 1994.

-J*DCA*ECD : T.W. Earp, Frank Dobson, Sculptor, Alec Tiranti, London 1945, (‘model’ pl.103); E.H.Ramsden, Twentieth Century Sculpture, 1949 (6); Sculpture, Theme and Variations, 1953 (44b); Sir John Rothenstein, Tate Gallery, 1962 (93); Tate Catalogue, 1964 (18); Frank Dobson, true and pure sculpture, Ke9le’s Yard, 1981, (32); The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (30).

Sir Osbert Sitwell, 5th Bt (1892–1969) recalled that he sat ‘nearly every day for three months to Frank Dobson near-by in Manresa Road’. Sitwell was an essayist, poet, novelist, and author of a four volume autobiography, Le$ Hand, Right Hand! A trustee of the Tate, 1951–58.

./ -.A/ OC.@ A FCJMA*D 4.--D4*J./

Illustrated opposite page 5

Folished bronze, height 16 inches / 41 cm

FC.MD/A/4D : June Trask; Byman Shaw School of Art, Trask Bequest; Private Collection

D+NJ3J*D0 : London, Leicester Galleries, Albert Rutherston, Paintings; Jean-Francois Millet, Drawings and Studies; Frank Dobson, Sculpture and Drawings, 1921 (114); London, Arts Council of Great Britain, Frank Dobson Memorial Exhibition 1966 (2)

-J*DCA*ECD : The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (5)

,, B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N ,&

3 "'(,"* 4.#14'$ 1923

American author and publisher Robert Menzies McAlmon’s Contact Editions published modernist works such as Gertrude Stein’s The Making of Americans, 1925. His own books of the era treated controversial subjects in a straightforward manner. Notably, in Distinguished Air: Grim Fairy Tales, where he recorded life in the gay subculture of Berlin. Born in CliIon, Kansas, McAlmon was the youngest of ten children of an itinerant Presbyterian minister. He has been described as an exemplar of the literary expatriate during the 1920s.

Bronze, height 13 inches / 33cm

FC.MD/A/4D : Dobson Estate

D+NJ3J*D0 : London Group at Heals’ Mansard Gallery, April 1923: Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, (16); Ke9le’s Yard, Cambridge, Frank Dobson, true and pure sculpture, July–August 1981, (34).

-J*DCA*ECD : Raymond Mortimer, Frank Dobson, Sculptor, Fleuron Press Ltd. 1926; Frank Dobson, true and pure sculpture, Ke9le’s Yard, Cambridge, 1981, no.34; The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (33).

,1 B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N ,2

4 3'4#$ ),#*,& 1926

Unique bronze, height 15 inches / 38cm. Incised: Dobson.

FC.MD/A/4D : (1) Dobson Estate.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Bristol Art Gallery, 1940, no.5; Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, no.25 (as Seated Girl).

-J*DCA*ECD : Parkes, Apollo, September 1928, p.130, (plaster); The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (55).

,# B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N ,<

5 1,' +. 4/,") 1927

Leopold Hamilton Myers, author of a series of historical novels between 1929–40, of which the four most popular were published under the title The Near and the Far in 1943. Myers invited Dobson to his home in Sussex and commissioned a portrait of each of his two daughters, Elsie Queen and Eveleen, later in 1927, si9ing to Dobson himself.

Unique bronze, height 23 inches / 58 cm. Incised: Dobson.

FC.MD/A/4D : Dobson Estate.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Gallery March–April 1927, (14); Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, (33); Frank Dobson, true and pure sculpture, Ke9le’s Yard, Cambridge, 1981, (44).

-J*DCA*ECD : Parkes, Apollo, September 1928, p.133, illustrated; Earp, Dobson, Alex Taranti, 1945, p.xv, pl..18b. The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (73).

," B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N ,%

6 %$,,1-$0 *'")' 1928

Bronze, height 18 inches / 46cm. Incised: Dobson 1/2.

FC.MD/A/4D : Dobson Estate (1). There is also a plaster, a terraco9a and a posthumous edition of 7ve casts in bronze with permission from the Dobson Estate.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, May–June 1930, (6); Bristol Art Gallery, 1940, (4); Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, (37); Ke9le’s Yard, Cambridge, Frank Dobson, true and pure sculpture 1981, (47).

-J*DCA*ECD : The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (82).

&L B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N &!

7 "+'&# 1930

Unique bronze, height 20 inches / 51 cm. Incised: Dobson.


D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, May–June, 1930, (11); Bristol Art Gallery, 1940, (12); Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, (42); Gillian Jason Gallery, Frank Dobson, Sculpture and Drawings, May–June 1984, (40), (Plaster).

-J*DCA*ECD : Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, (42); Francis Watson, pl..10; The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994, (96).

&, B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N &&

8 +,#& )*5&/ !'" 6#7 1933

./ -.A/ OC.@ *ND C.PA- A4A0D@P .O AC*(

Illustrated page 17

Bronze, height 20 inches / 51 cm

FC.MD/A/4D : Royal Academy of Arts, the artist’s Diploma work

D+NJ3J*D0 : London, Leicester Galleries, Sculpture and Drawings by Frank Dobson, 1935 (10); London, Arts Council of Great Britain, Frank Dobson Memorial Exhibition 1966 (45)


9 1#&/ &'"'*+/ #)+1,/-.''6," (1#&/ &'"'*+,# +,#&) 1933

Unique bronze, height 26 inches / 66cm. Incised: Dobson.


D+NJ3J*D0 : Royal Academy, 1933; Bristol Art Gallery 1940, (11) (as Lady Dorothea Head).

Commission, Lady Dorothy Ashley-Cooper (1907–87).


This portrait can be seen on the ?oor of Dobson’s bombed Manresa Road studio in a photograph taken during the war. Lady Dorothea was the daughter of Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 9th Earl of ShaIesbury.

&1 B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N &2

10 ),.'$& 6'"*"#-* '! #$$ 1940

Unique bronze and oxidised silver, height 10 inches / 25.4 cm. Incised: Dobson.

FC.MD/A/4D : the artist; Sir Robert and Lady Barlow (Margaret Rawlings); Bonhams 1991 (55); Edward Gelles; Gillian Jason Gallery.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Bristol Art Gallery, 1940; Hertford House, 1941 (plaster); CA , 1942; Leicester Galleries, London, Frank Dobson, 1954 (45), (terraco9a); Observer, Royal Watercolour Society Galleries, June 1950; Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial, 1966, (58); Jason & Rhodes, Frank Dobson, Sculpture & Drawings, October–November 1994, (5).

-J*DCA*ECD : Earp, Dobson, Alex Taranti, 1945, p.xvi, pl..28b, (terraco9a); Graves Art Gallery, She6eld, Frank Dobson Sculptor, 1966, no.5; The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (151).

The si9er is Ann, only daughter of the artist and his wife Mary. She was ten years old when she sat for this portrait in her father’s Bristol studio. A terraco9a of the subject First portrait of Ann, is with the Dobson Estate.

Photo: H

enry Moore Institute A

rchive

&# B R O N Z E F R A N K D O B S O N &<

11 (#*+," 1943

Bronze with dark green patina, height 7K inches / 19 cm

D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, Frank Dobson, 1944, (plaster); Arts Council of Great Britain, Memorial 1966, (61), as Bather, Woman Disrobing.

FC.MD/A/4D : the artist (1); Sylvia Gilley (Dobson’s studio assistant); Dobson Estate. (2) the artist; Douglas Cleverdon.

-J*DCA*ECD : The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994, (170).

&" P L A S T E R F R A N K D O B S O N &%

12 , .8. 4/,") (.+-1&’) +,#&) '.1920–21

Unique plaster, height 13 inches / 23cm

FC.MD/A/4D : Dobson Estate. One bronze, the si9er, c.1921. (2 A/F bronze casts, 2012, Dobson Estate).

D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, November 1921, (131) (bronze); Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, (7) (bronze); Frank Dobson, Sculpture 1915–1954, Courtauld Institute Galleries, January-April, 1995, (9) (bronze).


Elsie Queen Myers, born in 1908, was the eldest of the two daughters of Leopold Hamilton Myers, novelist and traveller. The portrait of E.Q. Myers remains the most interesting of all Dobson’s studies of children, notably for its un-posed manner and the directness of the si#er’s gaze (Robert Hopper, catalogue notes for the Courtauld Institute Galleries, 1995).

1L P L A S T E R F R A N K D O B S O N 1!

13 ",.54(,$* $5&, 1925

Plaster (2), uncoloured, height 3K inches / 8cm.


D+NJ3J*D0 : Plaster (1), with colour, Anthony d’O=ay Gallery; Sotheby’s. 8.11.89.


The fact that the head is missing appears to be intentional rather than the result of breakage.

14 ",.1-$-$0 $5&, !-05", 1928

Terraco9a, height 13 inches / 33cm


-J*DCA*ECD : Parkes, Apollo, September 1928, illustrated (as Noon); The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (74).

1, T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 1&

16 %$,,1-$0 !-05", 1935

Terraco9a, height 8K inches / 22 cm. Inscribed: Dobson.

FC.MD/A/4D : (1) Dobson Estate, (2) the artist: Tate Gallery, London; (3) Mrs. K. Ackner; by family descent, (4) The artist; Mrs M. Grace.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, April–May, 1935 (5); (2) Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, (49)


15 ),#*,& *'")' ()*5&/ !'" +#4 +-11 *'")' -) 1928

Unique terraco9a, height 8K inches / 22 cm


-J*DCA*ECD : The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (78); A study for stone carving, Ham Hill Torso, 1928 (80).

A bronze of the same subject, Torso, Study for Ham Hill Torso 2, incised O0 , height 23 cm / 9 inches, The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (79).

11 T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 12

17 !-")* 6'"*"#-* '! #5"-'1 )#1#4#$ 1934

Unique terraco9a, height 15 inches / 38 cm. Inscribed: Dobson.



Auriol Salaman was an assistant at Dobson’s studio in Manresa Road, Chelsea. She would have been twenty-two years old when this portrait was made.

1# T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 1<

18 )*5&/ !'" 6,"),6+'$, 1 1935

Unique terraco9a, height 5 inches / 13 cm

FC.MD/A/4D : Dobson Estate. The 7rst of four studies for Persephone. The other three, also in terraco9a remain extant.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, no.51, (as Sketch for Persephone), terraco9a, height 24ins (Study for Persephone 2).

-J*DCA*ECD : Frank Dobson, true and pure sculpture, Ke9le’s Yard, Cambridge, 1981 (63); Standing Figure for Persephone, height 14 ins, (Study for Persephone 3).

-J*DCA*ECD : Earp, Dobson, Alex Taranti, 1945, p.xv, pl..25; Journal of the Royal Institute of British Architects, 7 March 1936; Architectural Review, July 1936. The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (123).

Persephone, in monumental scale, was intended for installation on the sea front terrace of the new Bexhill Pavilion (architect, Serge Chermaye=). However, the stone 7gure of Persephone, begun in Dobson’s Bristol studio during the war remained un7nished when he leI Bristol and has since disappeared.

1" T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 1%

19 )*5&/ !'" 1#"0, 0"'56 2 (*3' !"-,$&)) 1940

Unique terraco9a, height 5K inches /14 cm Inscribed: Dobson.



The subject of this study relates to Study for Large Group I, [see cat.26].

2L T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 2!

21 !",,&'4 !"'4 3#$* 1941

Terraco9a, height 5K inches / 14cm


D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, November 1954, Frank Dobson, no.75. (as Freedom from Want, sketch)and a note. ‘Design for 7gures for Waterloo Bridge’.


See cat.27 for details of Waterloo Bridge project.

20 !",,&'4 !"'4 !,#" 1941

Terraco9a, height 4 inches / 10 cm


D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, Frank Dobson, no.78. (as Freedom from Fear, sketch) and a note, ‘Design for 7gures for Waterloo Bridge’.


A maque9e for the larger Freedom from Fear [cat.27]; see also for details of Waterloo Bridge project.

2, T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 2&

23 ,5"'6# #$& *+, (511 1946

Terraco9a, height 5 inches / 13 cm

FC.MD/A/4D : (1) the artist Elinor Bellingham-Smith; by family descent to her son. (2), Gillian Jason Gallery; Brooks Buxton; Christie’s, London.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, Frank Dobson, (80) (as Europa); Graves Art Gallery, 1966 (5) (plaster); Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial, 1966, (71) (plaster).

-J*DCA*ECD : The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (198). The 7rst of two listed terraco9as.

A bronze cast of this subject was shipped to America in Dobson’s life time where it became notorious, allowed into the United States only aIer being cleared by American Customs aIer a charge of possible impropriety.

22 ."#31-$0 3'4#$ '.1944

Unique terraco9a, height 6 inches / 15cm.


-J*DCA*ECD : Frank Dobson Sculpture and Drawings, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (175.)

A bronze edition of 7ve casts, Dobson Estate and Jason & Rhodes, 1994.

21 T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 22

24 4#"0#",* "#31-$0) 1936

Plaster, height 23 inches / 58cm.


Bronzes: (1) Manchester City Art Gallery ; (2) Leeds City Art Gallery; (3) Tate Gallery, London; (4) Ferens Art Gallery, Hull, (cast by the artist in 1946).

D+NJ3J*D0 : CA 1936; Bristol Art Gallery, 1940,(1) (bronze); Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, no.53 (bronze); Watson pl. 21; Ke9le’s Yard, Cambridge, Frank Dobson, pure and true sculpture, 1981, (68).

-J*DCA*ECD : Earp, Dobson 1945, p. xv, pl.27 (bronze); Apollo, p.xxiv, 1936 (bronze); The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (132)

Margaret Rawlings, born 1906 was the daughter of a clergyman who ran an English school in Japan, She did her training for the stage with a once-famous company, touring the plays of Bernard Shaw. Early in her career she made her own translation of Racine’s Phedre and staged it. She played many outstanding roles in London and New York including, Lady Macbeth, Gertrude in Hamlet, Shaw’s Lysistrata to Noel Coward’s King Magnus, Ibsen’s John Gabriel Borkman, Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya and Helen in Euripides’ The Trojan Women. She was married in 1942 to Sir Robert Barlow, who had been a patron of Dobson’s for some years.

Photo: H

enry Moore Institute A

rchive

2# T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 2<

25 $'$- 1938

Plaster, height 13 inches / 33cm


D+NJ3J*D0 : Bristol Art Gallery, 1940, (bronze); Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial no.55 (bronze).

-J*DCA*ECD : Earp, Dobson, 1945, Alex Taranti, p xvi, pl..28a; The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (137). (1) bronze and oxidised silver, Sir Robert and Lady Barlow (Margaret Rawlings); Bonhams 1991; Edward Gelles; Gillian Jason Gallery; (2) the artist: Bristol Museum and Art Gallery, 1940.

The si9er Joyce Addenbrook, was a dancer at the Windmill Theatre in Soho during the 1930s.

2" T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N 2%

26 )*5&/ !'" 1#"0, 0"'56 - 1940

Polychrome plaster, a plaster version of the terraco9a illustrated in The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, height 5K inches / 14cm

FC.MD/A/4D : the artist; Dobson Estate.

D+NJ3J*D0 : Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial, (as Study for Large Group), (59), (terraco9a).


This group is related to Study for Large Group 2 (Two Friends), see cat.19.

#L T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N #!

27 !",,&'4 !"'4 !,#" 1941

Plaster, height 9Q inches / 23 cm


Exhibited; Leicester Galleries, London, Frank Dobson, November 1954, (63), with a note: ‘Design for 7gures for Waterloo Bridge’.


It was proposed to place sculptures on the blocks at the corners of Giles Gilbert Sco9’s new Waterloo Bridge, built 1939–1942. The project was opened to a limited competition and the invited contestants were Epstein, Moore, Hepworth, Dobson, Kennington and Wheeler. Dobson submi9ed drawings based on the theme of Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms. (Freedom of Speech and Expression; Freedom of Worship; Freedom from Want and Freedom from Fear). Ultimately, it was decided to leave the bridge in its unadorned state’.

#, T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N #&

28 #&4-"#1 )-" 3-11-#4 4-1('5"$,-2#4,) %.( 1941

Plaster, height 22K inches / 57 cm


-J*DCA*ECD : Earp, Dobson, Alex Taranti, 1945, p.xvi, pl..32 a. (bronze), ‘Commissioned by the War Artist’s Advisory Commi#ee for the Admiralty’; The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (159), (bronze).

Admiral Milbourne-James was a British Naval Commander, politician and author, noted for his activities in the Naval Intelligence Division in World War I. During World War J J , he commanded Operation Ariel, the evacuation of British troops from Bri9any and Normandy in 1940, a parallel operation to the Dunkirk Evacuation. As a child, James sat as a subject for several paintings by his grandfather, John Evere9 Millais. The most well-known of these is Bubbles in which the 7ve year old James is shown gazing enraptured at a bubble he has just blown. The painting became famous when it was used in an advertisement for Pears Soap.

#1 T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N #2

29 ",.1-$-$0 !,4#1, $5&, %.1942–43

Plaster, height 6 inches / 15cm


D+NJ3J*D0 : Gillian Jason Gallery, Frank Dobson, 1984, (14).

-J*DCA*ECD : The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (161), (plaster). Four bronzes cast from the original plaster, Dobson Estate and Gillian Jason Gallery, 1984.

30 )*5&/ !'" *+, !'5$* 1944–45

Unique painted plaster, height 9 inches / 23cm


D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, Frank Dobson, November 1954, (42); Gillian Jason Gallery, Frank Dobson, Sculpture and Drawings, 1984, (32).

-J*DCA*ECD : The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994 (186). A maque9e for no.200, The Fount, 1947–48, (life size).

## T E R R A C O T TA F R A N K D O B S O N #<

32 ,5"'6# #$& *+, (511 1946

Plaster, height 5 inches / 13 cm


D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, Frank Dobson, November 1954 (80) (terraco9a, as Europa); Graves Art Gallery, January–February, 1966, (5), (plaster); Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966, (71), (plaster).

-J*DCA*ECD : The Studio, June 1948, (terraco9a); The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, Henry Moore Foundation / Lund Humphries, 1994, (198), (plaster).

For terraco9a example, see cat.23

31 ",.1-$-$0 3'4#$ '.1946

Unique painted plaster, height 5 inches / 13cm


D+NJ3J*D0 : Leicester Galleries, London, Frank Dobson, November 1954, (85) (as ‘plaster for lead’).


#" S T O N E A N D W O O D F R A N K D O B S O N #%

33 .'"$5.'6-# 1925–27

./ -.A/ OC.@ *ND E/JMDC(J*P .O NE-- AC* 4.--D4*J./

Illustrated on page 13

Ham Hill stone, height 42K inches / 108 cm

FC.MD/A/4D : Lord Ivor Spencer Churchill; Mrs Frank Dobson; Hull Univsersity Art Collection

D+NJ3J*D0 : London, Leicester Galleries, Sculpture and Drawings by Frank Dobson, 1927 (7); London, Arts Council of Great Britain, Frank Dobson Memorial Exhibition 1966 (26); London, Royal Academy of Arts and Stu9gart, Staatsgalerie, British Art in the Twentieth Century, 1987 (96)


34 *+, (5)%,") (*3' )*#$&-$0 !-05",)) '.1920

Wood carving on a semi circular base, height 14 inches / 35.5 cm

FC.MD/A/4D : A leaving present from Dobson to his studio assistant, Rupert Sheppard: thence by family descent.

This carving of two 7gures, one of them playing the concertina relates to Dobson’s Concertina Man (1920) now lost. It would appear likely that Dobson, an admirer of the sculpture of Ossip Zadkine, found inspiration for the subject in Zadkine’s Le Joueur d’accordeon, 1918. In 1922, he visited Zadkine’s studio in Paris. Traces of colour suggest that this piece was at one time painted.

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35 /'5$0 !-)+,"4#$ (/ # 3-$&'3 1919

Watercolour over pencil on paper, signed and dated F Dobson /19, lower centre

18K x 12 inches / 46.3 x 30.5 cm

FC.MD/A/4D : Cordelia Dobson; Mr and Mrs Alan Fortuno=, bought from The Fine Art Society

D+NJ3J*D0 : Arts Council of Great Britain Memorial 1966 (9)

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36 4#&'$$#

Graphite, pastel and coloured chalks

14 x 10 inches / 35.5 x 25.3 cm


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37 *3' ),#*,& !-05",) 3-*+ ('31 #$& 6-*.+,"

Graphite and pastel, 22 x 15 inches / 56.2 x 38 cm


This drawing relates to Dobson’s large scale bronze, London Pride

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38 )*#$&-$0 $5&, 1927

Pencil and watercolour, 19Q x 13Q inches / 49 x 33.5 cm

Signed in pencil ‘F Dobson’ and dated ‘27’ right centre.

FC.MD/A/4D : Private collection, London

D+NJ3J*JD0 : Alex. Reid & Lefevre, London. Their label verso gives the title as ‘Study by Dobson’; Jason & Rhodes, Frank Dobson, Sculpture and Drawings.

F R A N K D O B S O N <%

Dobson with his bronze of the actress Tallulah Bankhead, late 1920s (Henry Moore Institute Archive)

All venues in London unless otherwise stated

!"!# Allied Artist’s Association, Doré Galleries

!"!$ Frank Dobson, Paintings and Drawings,Chenil Galleries

!"!% Work by Members of the Artists’ Ri)es,Leicester Galleries

!"&' Group X, Heal’s Mansard Gallery

!"&! Albert Rutherston, Paintings; Jean-François Millet, Drawings and Studies; Frank Dobson, Sculpture and Drawings, Leicester Galleries

!"&# The London Group, Spring exhibition, Heal’s Mansard Gallery

!"&$ *+, Venice Biennale

Palace of Art, Empire Exhibition, Wembley

!"&( Arts League of Service Exhibition: Cedric Morris Painting, Frank Dobson Sculpture, Marion V. Dorn textiles, W.S. Murray Po9ery

!"&% +M Venice Biennale

European Artists Exhibition, tour to E( and Canada

International Exhibition, Dresden

!"&) Sculpture and Drawings by Frank Dobson, Leicester Galleries

!"&* *,+ Venice Biennale

!"&" Exhibition of Contemporary British Sculpture,The Museums Association Circulating Collection

!"#' Some Contemporary Sculptors: Drawings and Sculpture by Epstein, Moore, Dobson, Gaudier-Brzeska, Zwemmer Gallery

!"#! Small Bronzes, Terraco#as, Drawings by Frank Dobson, Arthur Tooth & Sons

!"#& *,+++ Venice Biennale

Frank Dobson; English Landscapes in Watercolour,Thomas Agnew & Son

!"#$ Watercolours and Drawings by Paul Nash and Frank Dobson, Redfern Gallery

!"#( Sculpture and Drawings by Frank Dobson, Leicester Galleries

!"#% Terraco#as by Frank Dobson, Brygos Gallery

!"#* Frank Dobson: Studies for the Mural at the Canadian Pavilion, Empire Exhibition, Glasgow, G.T. Nicholson Ltd

!"$' Exhibition of Sculpture and Drawings by Frank Dobson, Museum and Art Gallery, Bristol

!"$* Open Air Sculpture, London County Council / Arts Council of Great Britain, Ba9ersea

!"(! Ten Decades, A Review of British Taste -./-–-0/-, Arts Council, Festival of Britain, Institute of Contemporary Arts

Open Air Sculpture, London County Council / Arts Council of Great Britain, Ba9ersea

!"($ An Important Exhibition of Sculptures and Drawings by Frank Dobson '(1 23 , The Leicester Galleries

!"%$ The London Group (Obituary of Frank Dobson)

!"%% Drawings and Small Sculptures by Frank Dobson -..4–-045, Graves Art Gallery, She6eld

Frank Dobson: Memorial Exhibition, Arts Council Gallery

!")' Frank Dobson, Watercolours and Drawings, Hamet Gallery

!"*! British Sculpture in the Twentieth Century, Whitechapel Gallery

!"*& Frank Dobson, Drawings and Carvings,Anthony d’O=ay Gallery

!"*$ Frank Dobson; Drawings, Watercolour Landscapes and Small Sculpture, Gillian Jason Gallery

!"*% Sculpture Between the Wars, The Fine Art Society

!"*) British Art in the Twentieth Century, Royal Academy of Arts

!""$ Frank Dobson Selected Sculpture -0-/–-0/6, The Henry Moore Sculpture Trust, Leeds

!""$ Frank Dobson, Sculpture and Drawings,Jason & Rhodes

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS

F R A N K D O B S O N "!

Published by The Fine Art Society, in association with Gillian Jason, in an edition of 1,000 copies for the exhibition Frank Dobson Sculptor 1886–1963 held at 148 New Bond Street, London '1, from 20 June t0 7 July 2012

Catalogue © The Fine Art Society and Gillian Jason 2012 Essay © Neville Jason 2012

J(3/ 1 907052 14 9

Photography: Dominic Clemence, Miki Slingsby, A.C. Cooper Designed and typeset in Sweet Sans by Dalrymple Printed in Belgium by die Keure

Front cover: detail from Rhoda [cat.7]Frontispiece: Dobson in Manresa Road studio working on Persephone, c.1935–40 (Henry Moore Institute Archive)Back cover: detail from Two Seated Figures with Bowl and Pitcher [cat.37]

BIBLIOGRAPHYMonographsEarp, T.W., Frank Dobson, Sculptor, A. Tiranti 1945Jason, Neville and Thompson-Pharoah, Lisa, The Sculpture of Frank Dobson, The Henry Moore Foundation in association with Lund Humphries 1994Mortimer, Raymond, Frank Dobson, Fleuron Press Ltd. 1926

Art History and CriticismAumonier, William, Modern Architectural Sculpture, The Architectural Press 1930Casson, Stanley (Ed.), Artists at Work (based on a 334 broadcast intrerview), Harrap 1933Casson, Stanley, **th Century Sculptors, Oxford University Press 1930Fry, Roger, Transformations: Critical and Speculative Essays on Art, Cha9o & Windus 1926Glaves-Smith, John, ‘The Primitive, Objectivity, and Modernity: some issues in British Sculpture in the 1920s’, in British Sculpture in the Twentieth Century, Whitechapel Gallery 1981Parkes, W. Kineton, Sculpture of Today, Chapman & Hall 1921Parkes, W. Kineton, The Art of Carved Sculpture, Chapman & Hall 1931Ramsden, E.H., Twentieth Century Sculpture, Pleiades Books 1949Ramsden, E.H., Sculpture: Themes and Variations, Lund Humphries 1953Read, Benedict, Sculpture Between the Wars, The Fine Art Society 1986Shone, Richard, ‘Painting and Sculpture in the 1920s’, in British Sculpture in the Twentieth Century, Whitechapel Gallery 1981

Selected Articles, Essays and ReviewsAuty, Giles, ‘Frank Dobson’, The Spectator, 1994Bell, Clive, ‘An Ancient and Two Moderns’, Vogue, February 1922Bell, Clive, ‘Art Notes’, Vogue, March 1927Cork, Richard, ‘Dark Heart of Stone’, The Times, 1 November 1994Earp, T.W., ‘The Art of Frank Dobson’, Britain Today, no.76, August 1942Feaver, William, Observer, 2 August 1981Fry, Roger, ‘Mr Frank Dobson’s Sculpture’, Burlington Magazine, April 1925 (Reprinted in Transformations, Cha9o & Windus 1926)

Gale, Iain, ‘Moore means Less’, The Independent, 8 November 1994Gayford, Martin, ‘Frank Dobson’, Henry Moore Institute; Jason & Rhodes, The Guardian, 1994Janusczak, Waldemar, The Guardian, 11 July 1981Lee, David, ‘Dobson’s Choice’, Arts Review, November 1994Lewis, David, ‘Frank Dobson’, Facet, The Arts Magazine of the West, Spring 1947Melville, Robert, ‘Frank Dobson and Others’, The Listener, 2 March 1944Neve, Christopher, ‘The Pure Sculpture of Frank Dobson’, Country Life, 30 June 1966Read, Herbert, ‘Architecture and Sculpture’, The Listener, 30 July 1930Russell-Taylor, John, The Times, 14 July 1981‘The Sculpture of Frank Dobson’, Art Book Review Quarterly, 1995Sewell, Brian, ‘A Reputation up in Smoke’, Evening Standard, 16 March 1995Spencer, Charles S., ‘Decline or Delight’, Arts Review, 9 July 1966Spurling, John, New Statesman, 10 July 1981Su9on, Denys, ‘The Concensus Again’, Financial Times, 28 June 1966Vaizey, Marina, Sunday Times, 26 July 1981Vogue, ‘A Modern English Sculptor’, June 1926Watson, Francis, ‘Frank Dobson: Four Drawings’, The Connoisseur, January 1963

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