Gerald Wilde

Red Composition

1952

© The estate of Gerald Wilde

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Not on display

Artist: Gerald Wilde 1905–1986
Medium: Oil paint on paper on cardboard
Dimensions: Support: 813 × 559 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by P.A. Cook 1961
Reference: T00413

Catalogue entry

T00413 RED COMPOSITION 1952

Inscr. ‘Gerald Wilde. 52.’ b.r. (signature and date added March 1961).
Oil on paper, laid on cardboard, 30×22 (76·5×56).
Presented by P. A. Cook 1961.
Coll: Purchased by P.A. Cook from the artist 1952.

This painting was purchased privately and had never been exhibited. The artist confirmed (27 March 1961) that it was painted in 1952 and added a signature and date. When asked about the genesis of his pictures he said that the idea for each of them was obscure to him and that although he often began with a small sketch, this sketch would become completely transformed in the final oil. He described the Tate picture as ‘partly abstract, partly figurative’.

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