Augustus John (140 page)

65
  
Horizon
Volume X No. 56 (August 1944), pp. 132–3.

66
  
Ibid.
p. 132.

67
  Augustus to Dorelia n.d. (1 November 1928). NLW MS 22778D fols. 121–2.

68
  Lord D’Abernon Papers, British Library 48932.

69
  
Ibid.
48936.

70
  Augustus to Dorelia n.d. (3 September 1928). NLW MS 22778D fols. 95–6.

71
  Lord Leverhulme to A. Wilson Barrett, editor of
Colour.
Blumenfeld Papers, House of Lords Library.

72
  
Daily Express
(15 October 1920). See also the editions of 8 and 9 October. Also the
Literary Digest
(27 November 1920) and
American Art News
(13 November 1920).

73
  John to T. E. Lawrence n.d. NLW MS 22775C fol. 58.

74
  Edward Morris
Lord Leverhulme
‘Painting and Sculpture’ (Royal Academy of Arts, 1980). See also Nigel Nicolson
Lord of the Isles
(1960), p. 11, and W. P. Jolly
Lord Leverhulme
(1976), pp. 190–6.

75
  
Chiaroscuro
pp. 150–1. See also
Horizon
Volume X No. 56 (August 1944), pp. 134–5.

76
  
Ibid.

77
  Lord Conway of Allington to John from the Imperial War Museum, 5 May 1935. NLW MS 22779E fol. 173.

78
  
Sunday Dispatch
(28 September 1930). See also
News Chronicle
(29 September 1930);
Daily Mail
(29 September 1930), and
The Scotsman
(30 September 1930).

79
  
Chiaroscuro
p. 147. See also
Horizon
Volume X No. 56 (August 1944), p. 131.

80
  Tallulah Bankhead
Tallulah, My Autobiography
(1952), p. 156.

81
  
Ibid.
p. 154.

82
  See Lee Israel
Miss Tallulah Bankhead
(1972), p. 127. Also Brendan Gill’s
Tallulah
(1973), in which a letter and photograph of John are reproduced on p. 130, and a drawing on p. 131. After Tallulah Bankhead’s death, both her John pictures were sold at the Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York. Her own portrait, appraised at $15,000, was sold for $19,500 and is now in the National Gallery in Washington, DC. The portrait of Gerald du Maurier, appraised between $9,000 and $12,000, fetched only $5,000 and later passed into the collection of Gerald du Maurier’s daughter, Jeanne du Maurier.

83
  T. E. Lawrence to John, 19 April 1930. NLW MS 22783D fol. 12.

84
  Interview on
Face to Face,
BBC Television, 15 May 1960.

85
  John to Maud Cazalet, 3 March 1939.

86
  John to Kassie, 23 November 1939. NLW MS 21570E.

87
  
John to Maud Cazalet, 23 September 1939.

88
  Letter from A. Pernn, the Queen’s Private Secretary, to John, 1 November 1939. Clarence House.

89
  John to HM Queen Elizabeth, 20 January 1940.

90
  John to Gerald Kelly, 7 April 1954. Royal Academy.

91
  HM Queen Elizabeth to John, 16 October 1942. NLW MS 22780E fols. 73–4·

92
  HM Queen Elizabeth to John, 2 December 1948. NLW MS 22780E fols. 75–6.

93
  Augustus to Caspar John, 30 July 1960. NLW MS 22775C fol. 45.

94
  HM Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother to John, 19 July 1961 from Clarence House. NLW MS 22780E fols. 77–8.

95
  ‘Mr Augustus John and the Royal Academy’
The Times
(31 March 1920).

96
  Augustus to Gwen John, May 1920. NLW MS 22305D fols. 130–2.

97
  
Horizon
Volume X No. 56 (August 1944), p. 146.

In a letter to his mother, Christopher Wood wrote (22 May 1922): ‘Augustus John has been admitted to the Academy this year. They wouldn’t have him before. I don’t think he takes this as an honour in the least, as it doesn’t matter much to him whether he is an A.R.A. or not. He is unquestionably the greatest painter in England to-day and if he hadn’t drunk so much would have been greater than Leonardo da Vinci or Michelangelo.’

98
  Edwin William John to Gwen John, 1 May 1920. NLW MS 22306D fols. 28–9.

99
  John to Sean O’Casey n.d. (1928–9). There are ten letters from John to O’Casey (1926–52) at the National Library of Wales. NLW MS 21980C.

100
  John to Ursula Tyrwhitt, 7 April 1958. NLW MS 19645C.

101
  John to Bapsy Pavry, 8 October 1948. NLW MS 21622D.

102
  T. E. Lawrence to John, 9 April 1930. NLW MS 22783D fol. 11.

103
  Dorelia to Edwin John, 3 May 1938. NLW MS 22313D fols. 8–9.

104
  John to Laura Knight, 9 April 1938. In another letter to Laura Knight (3 May 1938. NLW MS 21570E) John wrote: ‘Although I did so little directly to affect the general policy of the Academy, always feeling somewhat ill-at-ease within those sacred precincts, my views as to a more liberal though
not
less critical an attitude to outside activities must have been well known and, I felt sometimes, even regarded with grave suspicion… The President, I know, had the courage to advocate a more enlightened attitude towards modern painting & I can assure you it was a particularly painful experience for me to take so violent a step… What you say is quite true of the necessarily slow & belated movement towards reform in a body like the R.A. The fact is it will always be too slow...’

105
  John to Philip Connard, 18 January 1944.

106
  Augustus to Edwin John, 5 July 1944. NLW MS 22312C fol. 52.

107
  See
Daily Graphic
(14 June 1924).

108
  
Christian Science Monitor,
Boston (17 December 1923);
Statesman
,
Calcutta (12 October 1924).

109
  See, for example,
Colour
(November–December 1923 and January 1924).

110
  Eugene Goossens ‘Culture in Music’
Daily Express
(19 July 1924).

111
  
The Economist
(15 March 1924), p. 592.

112
  
Manchester Guardian Weekly
(3 October 1924).

113
  John to Mitchell Kennerley, 22 November 1926. New York Public Library.

114
  Knewstub to John from King’s Nursing Home, 22 December 1922. NLW MS 22782D fol. 167.

115
  Quoted in Richard Shone
Augustus John
(1979), p. 10.

116
  John to J. B. Manson, 2 July 1927.

117
  John to J. B. Manson, 4 July 1927.

118
  John to Wyndham Lewis, 9 December 1927.

119
  
Augustus to Dorelia n.d.

120
  Poppet Pol to the author, March 1970.

121
  
Ibid.

122
  John to Mitchell Kennerley, 22 November 1926.

123
  John to Mitchell Kennerley, 22 November 1922.

124
  John to Viva Booth, 14 May 1922.

125
  Augustus to Dorelia, 13 May 1922. NLW 22778D fols. 31–2.

126
  
Horizon
Volume VII No. 37 (January 1943), p. 60. Cf.
Chiaroscuro
p. 181.

127
  Augustus to Dorelia, 13 June 1922. NLW MS 22778D fol. 35.

128
  
Horizon
Volume VII No. 37 (January 1943), pp. 63–4.

129
  John to Ottoline Morrell, 1 February 1922.

130
  Augustus to Dorelia n.d. (June 1924). NLW MS 22778D fol. 55.

131
  Sir Compton Mackenzie
My Life and Times
Octave 6 (1963–71), pp. 39–40, and Ulick O’Connor
Oliver St John Gogarty
(1964), p. 212. But for an amended version of this story see Mark Amory
Lord Dunsany: A Biography
(1972).

132
  Augustus to Dorelia n.d. (April 1925). NLW MS 22778D fol. 68.

133
  
Horizon
Volume X No. 56 (August 1944), p. 129.

134
  Lord D’Abernon’s diary,
An Ambassador of Peace
Volume III
The Years of Recovery January 1924–October 1926
(1930), p. 15.

135
  
Ibid.
p. 16.

136
  Augustus to Dorelia n.d. (April 1925). NLW MS 22778D fol. 68.

‘The sittings for this portrait took place mostly at 3 o’cl. p.m. and already at that time I have asked Sir Augustus to put below the portrait: The German Minister for Foreign Affairs at 3 o’cl in the afternoon, for I don’t think that I am really so sleepy and broken down as I am represented on this picture.’ Stresemann to Dr Ruppel, 12 June 1926. The portrait of Stresemann is now in the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.

137
  Lord D’Abernon
An Ambassador of Peace
Volume III p. 152.

138
  Publisher, and director of the Anderson Gallery, 489 Park Avenue, New York.

139
  
Horizon
Volume XI No. 64 (April 1945), p. 242.

140
  Romilly John
The Seventh Child
p. 218.

141
  
Chiaroscuro
p. 190.

142
  
Horizon
Volume XI No. 64 (April 1945), p. 244.

143
  
Ibid.
p. 244.

144
  John to Oliver St Gogarty, 22 May 1925. The two girls, Cleves and Pita, were the daughters of Countess Stead.

145
  Richard Shone
Augustus John
p. 10.

146
  Augustus to Dorelia n.d. (April 1923). NLW MS 22778D fols. 39–40. But he came away ‘feeling considerably older & less wise than before, and certainly not much richer,’ he told Christabel McLaren. British Library Add. MS 52556 fol. 60.

147
  For a list of John’s works shown at this exhibition, see Milton W. Brown
The Story of the Armory Show
(1963), pp. 253–5.

148
  B. L. Reid
The Man from New York
(1968), p. 152.

149
  
Horizon
Volume X No. 56 (August 1944), p. 141.

150
  
Chiaroscuro
p. 160.

151
  Conger Goodyear
Augustus John
p. 29.

152
  Augustus to Dorelia n.d. (April 1923). NLW MS 22778D fols. 41–2.

153
  Conger Goodyear
op. cit.
p. 29.

154
  Augustus to Dorelia, 17 April 1923. NLW MS 22778D fol. 43.

155
  
Horizon
Volume X No. 56 (August 1944), pp. 141–2.

156
  See, for example, his letter of 16 February 1923 to Homer Saint Gaudens (American Archives of Art). Most of the articles written about him show
little evidence of his co-operation – see ‘A Much-Talked of Painter’
New York Times Magazine
(24 June 1923).

157
  Augustus to Dorelia, 17 April 1923. NLW MS 22778D fol. 43.

158
  
Horizon
Volume XII No. 72 (December 1945), p. 418.

159
  
Art News
,
New York (16 June 1923), pp. 1, 4.

160
  
Ibid.
p. 4.

161
  Jeanne Foster to Gwen John, 14 August 1924. NLW MS 22305D fol. 66.

162
  Mitchell Kennerley to John, 13 August 1924. NLW MS 22782D fols. 151–2.

163
  Introduction by E. J. Rousuck to Catalogue for ‘Augustus John’, Scott & Fowles, 21 March–12 April 1949: ‘an electric event which produced not only a new group of paintings, but countless anecdotes, legends, friendships that enriched the great saga of John’s career.’

164
  Jeanne Foster to Gwen John n.d. (April 1924). NLW MS 22305D fol. 63.

165
  Homer Saint Gaudens to Martin Birnbaum, 23 June 1924. American Archives of Art.

166
  Now in the National Gallery, Washington, DC.

167
  John to Mitchell Kennerley n.d.

168
  John to Christabel Aberconway, 29 September 1928. This correspondence is in the British Library. See also the correspondence with Nina Hamnett at the University of Texas.

169
  
Horizon
Volume XII No. 72 (December 1945), pp. 419–20.

170
  Augustus to Gwen John, May 1920. NLW MS 22305D fols. 130–2.

CHAPTER X: THE WAY THEY LIVED THEN

1
  Nicolette Devas
Two Flamboyant Fathers
(1966), p. 65.

2
  John to Christabel Aberconway. British Library Add. MS 52556.

3
  Cecil Beaton
The Glass of Fashion
(1954), p. 156.

4
  For a full analysis of this studio, which was designed by Christopher Nicholson, see
Architectural Review
Volume LXXVII (February 1935), pp. 65–8.

5
  Cecil Beaton
The Glass of Fashion
p. 158.

6
  Nicolette Devas
Two Flamboyant Fathers
p. 66.

7
  Adrian Daintrey
I
Must Say
(1963), p. 75.

8
  BBC Home Service, 8 November 1963.

9
  Dorelia to Lytton Strachey, 4 December 1918.

10
  Henry Lamb’s letters to Carrington are in the University of Texas Library, Austin, Texas.

11
  Anthony Powell
Journals 1982–1986
(1995), pp. 115–16, entry for 30 June 1984.

12
  Keith Clements
Henry Lamb. The Artist and his Friends
(1985), p. 57.

13
  Lamb to Carrington n.d.

14
  Keith Clements
Henry Lamb
p. 60.

15
  Diana Mosley to the author, 5 January 1970.