Albert Houthuesen

Maes Gwyn Stack Yard

1935

Not on display

Artist: Albert Houthuesen 1903–1979
Medium: Oil paint on canvas
Dimensions: Support: 914 x 1219 mm
frame: 1018 x 1324 x 75 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by the Trustees of the Chantrey Bequest 1939
Reference: N05328

Catalogue entry

N05328 MAES GWYN STACK YARD 1935

Inscr. ‘Albert Houthuesen 1935’ b.r.
Canvas, 36×48 (91·5×122).
Chantrey Purchase from the artist 1939.
Exh: N.E.A.C., October–November 1936 (127); R.A., 1939 (468).

The picture was painted out of doors at Maes Gwyn Farm, Llanara, near Holywell, North Wales, where the artist was staying. In a letter (23 March 1958) he recalls his impressions: ‘A wonderful landscape wherever one looked, and in the village lived colliers who worked at the Point of Air colliery, two or three miles away on the coast. Painting in the open or near a cottage I heard women singing beautifully, not snatches of song but complete melodies. I cannot tell you how much the character of the whole place and the people fascinated me.’

Published in:
Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture, London 1964, I