Wednesday 29 September 2010

Art for discerning minds, circa 1950

Above: Adrian Allinson, Cotswold Cross Roads.
Above: Charles Atamian, Shrimping.
Above: Harold Harvey, The Blue Door, Newlyn.
Above: J.B. Souter, Nerine Lily.

Above: Alan Beeton, Goings On.
Above: Jan Kagie, The Pines on the Dunes.
Above: R. Ward Binks, River Swans.
Above: Ellen Jowett, Mrs. Urquhart.

I love the colour and kitsch beauty of these pictures. Images from The Homelovers Book: Colour Facsimiles, Mezzotint Engravings for Home Decoration, edited by Warren E. Cox, Bristol. (No date is given but I would say it's around 1950.)

From the introduction:
Art and the display of it in our dwellings is more than the mere decoration of a barren wall....It is the appreciation of the aesthetic values in life which offsets the insistent forces of materialism and enables us to retain our sense of fitness in all things and gives us poise and serenity in a difficult world. Our children with their quick sympathies and discerning minds will respond to such surroundings ...and reward us in our latter years by the testimony of their conduct.

Lofty ideals considering that what we are dealing with here is really a mid century verson of AllPosters.com.

4 comments:

jen storer said...

I am discerning away, sandra, and they are beautiful. the colour and the light in particular. i love them all. i want that book! jx

rigel said...

wow. such a stark contrast when you consider the type of art we fill our homes with today. they're very lovely though. i wish i could hang "the river swans" over my couch. gorgeous.

Sandra Eterovic said...

I'm so glad that you both like them! Looking at them as a group I think that they are more pretty than kitsch.
;)

Frances said...

I keep popping back to look at Goings On. So funny and touching.