Walter Edward Penn – The Fall o’ The Year

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Oil on panel, housed in a 19thc Italian Giltwood Florentine frame. Indistinctly signed and dated, Walter Penn 17 ? 1917, (lower right). A label with the artists name address and title are written on the back of the frame, together with a Chas H West, R.A. label.

Panel: 13 5/8 x 9 1/8 in. (34.6 x 23.2 cm.)
Frame: 21 x 16 1/2 in. (53.3 x 42 cm.)

The Florentine Giltwood frame used for “The Fall of The Year” was not made by Charles H West but was probably supplied by him.

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Penn, Walter Edward (1881-1959)

Description

“The Fall o’ The Year” is reminiscent of work by artists such as Pissarro and the Italian artist Vittore Grubicy de Dragon. Titles for Penn’s early work and his use of a 19th century Florentine frame reflects his interest in continental art of the of the late 19th and early 20th century. The painting is indistinctly signed, Walter Penn and looks to be dated 17 (1917). The label on the reverse suggests that the painting may have been submitted but possibly rejected as no such title can be found in the summer exhibition catalogues. Unless the title was changed to “Mid-day in Provence” for his exhibit in 1927, it would seem unlikely the picture was exhibited at the R.A.

From 1912 to 1945 Walter Penn exhibited a total of 5 works at the Royal Academy. Between 1912 and 1929 when living at The Whym in Bosham, Chichester, he exhibited 3 paintings;- 1912., No.1101 Stones;- 1927., No. 907 Mid-day in Provence;- 1929., No. 719 Place des Ramparts, St. Tropez, Var.

The label on the back implies the frame was supplied and delivered to the R.A. by Charles Henry West 1895-1947, trading from 117 Finchley Road, London, 1901-1960. As an artists’ colourman, picture framer and gilder, West advertised ‘Power-driven machinery’ and offered ‘Vans to all Exhibitions’ (The Year’s Art 1903). In 1934, he advertised as ‘Artists’ Colourman, Exhibition Agent, Frame Maker’, reproducing a view of his picture frame showroom (The Artist, vol.7, March 1934), and claiming, ‘The framing of your R.A. picture will provide no problem if placed in the hands of Chas. H. West, who has specialised in this class of work for the past 50 years. He holds very large stocks of mouldings of all descriptions, and a vast number of frames of all sizes for selecting purposes’. The Sheffield artist, Stanley Royle, gave C.H. West as an accommodation address for his Royal Academy exhibits, 1934-38, as did Adrian Allinson, 1933-35.

Brand

Penn, Walter Edward (1881-1959)

When Walter Edward Penn was born on 10 June 1881, in Lambeth, London, his father, Walter Edward Penn, was 26 and his mother, Louisa Kate Andrews, was 25. Penn had only two terms of artistic tuition at Bedford School of Art and thereafter was largely self taught. He married Annie Eliza Milner in 1905, and settled in Bosham, West Sussex, that year in a house ‘The Whym’ he had designed himself. Penn first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1912, a watercolour ‘Stones’ which was hung ‘on the line’. In the period to 1945, Penn showed a total of five works at the Royal Academy and another two with the Royal Cambrian Academy. However, most of his work was exhibited in the large provincial shows held in places such as Brighton, Southsea and Chichester. During the 1920s Penn, his first wife and son, would spend the winters at their villa in St Tropez. Also in the 1920s he painted some fairy subjects at Hunstanton in north Norfolk. In 1931 he moved to Creek House in Bosham and in 1941 he remarried. In 1952 Penn held an exhibition in his studio of about ninety of his paintings which proved popular, especially the local views of Bosham. He was a man of great Christian faith. We were generously sent this biography by Grant M. Waters, author of the Dictionary of British Artists working from 1900-1950, who had gathered the information from the artists second wife in the mid 1970s.

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