L.S. Lowry

The Pond

1950

© The estate of L.S. Lowry/DACS 2019

License this image

In Tate Britain

Walk Through British Art: 1950

Free entry

Artist: L.S. Lowry 1887–1976
Medium: Oil paint on canvas
Dimensions: Support: 1143 x 1524 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by the Trustees of the Chantrey Bequest 1951
Reference: N06032

Display caption

This industrial landscape contains many features typical of Lowry’s work: smoking chimneys, terraced houses, the Stockport Viaduct, and figures swarming through the city’s streets and open spaces. Though seen as a realist, Lowry’s works were largely composed from a variety of repeated motifs, becoming increasingly nostalgic as time went on. The artist said, ‘I hadn’t the slightest idea of what
I was going to put in the canvas when I started the picture but it eventually came out as you see it. This is the way I like working best.’

Gallery label, September 2016

Does this text contain inaccurate information or language that you feel we should improve or change? We would like to hear from you.

Catalogue entry

N06032 THE POND 1950

Inscr. ‘L.S. Lowry 1950’ b.r.
Canvas, 45×60 (114·5×152·5).
Chantrey Purchase from the artist through the Lefevre Gallery 1951.
Exh: Lefevre Gallery, March 1951 (1); R.A., 1951 (564).
Lit: Mervyn Levy, L. S. Lowry, A.R.A., 1961, pp.13–14, repr. pl.14 (in colour).
Repr: Maurice Collis, The Discovery of L. S. Lowry, 1951, pl.23; Mervyn Levy, Drawing and Painting for Young People, 1960, facing p.65.

‘This is a composite picture built up from a blank canvas. I hadn't the slightest idea of what I was going to put in the canvas when I started the picture but it eventually came out as you see it. This is the way I like working best’ (letter from the artist, 21 January 1956).

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