Henry Lamb

Lamentation

1911

Not on display

Artist: Henry Lamb 1883–1960
Medium: Oil paint on canvas
Dimensions: Support: 914 x 610 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Purchased 1956
Reference: T00102

Catalogue entry

T00102 LAMENTATION 1911

Inscr. ‘Lamb 1911’ t.l. and, on back, ‘Henry Lamb 1911’.
Canvas, 36×21 (91·5×61).
Presented by the Contemporary Art Society 1956.
Coll: Hugh Blaker; Leicester Galleries; C.A.S.
Exh: N.E.A.C., summer 1911 (209); Contemporary British Art, Whitechapel Art Gallery, October–December 1928 (Upper Gallery, 8); The Hugh Blaker Collection, Platt Hall, Rusholme, Manchester, May–June 1929 (86), and Brighton, September–October 1929 (78); New Year Exhibition, Leicester Galleries, January 1952 (61).

Painted soon after a long stay in Brittany 1910–11 where the artist had witnessed the death of a peasant woman, the mother of ten children; this work and the two versions of ‘Death of a Peasant’ (see N05630 above) were based on sketches made on the spot (letter from the artist, 24 August 1956). First exhibited as ‘Lamentation’, this work has also been known as ‘Mourners’. A much later version of the composition, signed and dated 1953, was included in the Memorial

Exhibition, Leicester Galleries, December 1961 (29), as ‘Mourning - Souvenir of Brittany (1910)’.

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