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Notes

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This portrait of the artist’s wife Gladys Hoskins (1990–1979), known as Froanna, was made in America where Lewis spent the war years. The artist bought the distinctive blue paper in a drugstore and the unusual support perhaps inspired his use of coloured chalks. With the exception of the ornate turban, the artist restricts himself to bold lines and a few areas of shading. Nonetheless, he captures a sense of strain and intensity in the sitter, enhanced by the lack of a setting. Lewis was one of the leading British avant-garde artists who explored the lessons of continental modernism.

The Barber Institute of Fine Arts

Birmingham

Title

A Portrait of the Artist's Wife, 'Froanna'

Date

1940

Medium

pencil & coloured chalks on blue paper

Measurements

H 48.3 x W 31 cm

Accession number

2006.3

Acquisition method

purchased with the assistance of the Art Fund and the Victoria and Albert Museum Purchase Grant Fund, 2006

Work type

Drawing & watercolour

The Barber Institute of Fine Arts

University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham, West Midlands B15 2TS England

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Artist or maker

Wyndham Lewis

1882–1957

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