Augustus John (125 page)

1933

January, Leicester Galleries: Sixty Etchings. LL D Cardiff University.

August, appointed trustee of the Tate Gallery (to 1941). Venice.

1934

Augustus John
by T. W. Earp, published by Nelson.

21 May, elected President of Royal Cambrian Academy of Art.

September, Paris.

October (to February 1935), ‘Etchings at the National Museum of Wales’ (catalogue by Kighley Baxandall). Mallord Street sold to Gracie Fields. New studio built at Fryern Court.

1935

30 April, ‘La Séraphita’ and other paintings destroyed in fire at Fryern.

14 May, letter to
The Times
about Stanley Spencer’s works.

June, borrows Vanessa Bell’s studio for one month.

22 June, Henry John missing. Body found drowned on 6 July.

November, takes studio at 49 Glebe Place.

1936

5–29 February, Adams Gallery: Forty Etchings.

April, Paris.

25 April, Laugharne Castle, Carmarthen. Portrait of Dylan Thomas.

26 May, fined £5 for drinking after hours at the Old Mill Club, Salisbury.

June, represented at XX Biennial International Art Exhibition (4 paintings).

Autumn, British Empire Exhibition, Johannesburg. Works (later with Ernst Stern) on designs for costumes and scenery for C. B. Cochran’s production of J. M. Barrie’s
The Boy David,
which opened on 14 December.

1937

Associated with new school of drawing and painting under the direction of Claude Rogers, Victor Pasmore and William Coldstream. Elected President of the Gypsy Lore Society.

March, Wildenstein Gallery, London: Thirty Drawings.

February–May, Jamaica. Travels back on a banana boat via Rotterdam.

September, rents Mas de Galeron, St-Rémy-de-Provence.Visits Matthew Smith at Aix-en-Provence.

1938

February, one of three British artists (with Sickert and Steer) represented at Exhibition of British Art at the Louvre, Paris.

March, Leicester Galleries: Drawings. Takes Park Studio, Pelham Street, London.

7 April, father dies in Tenby.

28 April, resigns from Royal Academy following its rejection of Wyndham Lewis’s portrait of T. S. Eliot.

19 May–11 June, Tooth’s Gallery: Latest Paintings (32), including Jamaican pictures.

18 June, Dorelia’s mother dies following a fall from the balcony of her bedroom at Fryern Court on 20 May.

4 July, opens Exhibition of Twentieth-Century German Art at Burlington House.

July, signs contract with Jonathan Cape for autobiography.

August, at Laugharne with Richard Hughes.

27 August, goes to Mas de Galeron.

1939

February–March, Redfern Gallery: Exhibition of Paintings by John, Innes and Derwent Lees.

July–August, Mas de Galeron.

18 September, Gwen John dies at Dieppe.

Autumn, begins painting the Queen. Represented at British Council Exhibition, New York.

1940

Honorary Member of the London Group.

16 February, re-elected to the Royal Academy.

July, moves to studio at 33 Tite Street, Chelsea.

November, National Gallery: ‘British Painting Since Whistler: Drawings of Augustus John’ (112).

December, exhibition at the Francis Taylor Gallery, Hollywood.

1941

February, starts writing for Cyril Connolly’s
Horizon
(until April 1949).

June, Redfern Gallery: Drawings (40).

July, joins the Green Shirts and ‘throws in his lot’ with the Social Credit Party.

October, Augustus John
Drawings,
edited by Lillian Browse, published by Faber and Faber.

1942

March, etchings collected by Gerald Brockhurst shown at Boston Library, Massachusetts.

11 June, awarded Order of Merit (investiture 2 July).

31 June, writes to
The Times
deploring the lack of interest shown by press and public in Ethel Walker’s exhibition at the Lefevre Gallery.

October, article on Gwen John published by
Burlington Magazine.

1943

January, elected Honorary Member, American National Institute of Arts and Letters. Artists’ International Association (1 painting).

May, Leicester Galleries: ‘Drawings by Augustus John, Paintings by Gilbert Spencer’.

1944

Matthew Smith stays at Fryern; he and John paint each other.

14 March, Alfred Munnings 24 votes, John 17 in elections for the presidency of the Royal Academy.

7 June, in a light fawn tropical suit opens Exhibition of Indian Art for the Mayor of Calcutta’s Relief Fund.

2 August, appointed First President of the Central Institute of Art and Design.

October,
Augustus John
by John Rothenstein published by Phaidon and Allen & Unwin as Phaidon Press Art Books: ‘British Artists’ series, No. 2.

1945

In Wales with the Howard de Waldens.

July–November, Tite Street studio under repair.

1946

Introduction to Gwen John exhibition (Arts Council). Elected chairman of the Contemporary Art Society for Wales. Elected member of Académie Royale de Belgique. Jeu de Paume, Paris: represented in ‘Exposition de peinture anglaise du XX siècle’ (portraits and a composition).

24 July–31 August, Temple Newsam House, Leeds: Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings (124 exhibits).

24 December, letter to
The Times
about the dangers of picture cleaning at the National Gallery.

1947

A long convalescence. September–October, Mousehole, Cornwall.

1948

May, Leicester Galleries: Exhibition of work from previous fifteen years (52 exhibits), including 12-foot canvas ‘The Little Concert’ (grisaille).

31 May, on the cover of
Time
magazine, USA.

10 July, elected President of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters.

30 July, Welsh National Eisteddfod, Bridgend. Arts Council Exhibition: Paintings (61) and Drawings (65).

October, American-British Art Center: Drawings.

1949

7 March, ‘Engaged on a long and vast composition’ (letter to Wyndham Lewis).

21 March–12 April, Scott & Fowles, New York: Exhibition of Works in American Collections (23 paintings).

9 September, radio talk for BBC, Far Eastern Service, ‘I Speak for Myself’.

November, Lefevre Gallery: ‘Works by Augustus John and Ethel Walker’. ‘Frontiers’ published by
Delphic Review.

1950

30 April, profile in London
Observer.

June–July, Mas de Galeron given up.

July–August, Hôtel de Bourgogne, Paris: ‘a course of injections’.

29 August, letter to
The Times
on art students at the National Gallery. Castello San Peyre, Opio, France.

October, Paris.

1951

15
January, Café Royal closes. Leaves Tite Street studio.

17 August, letter to
The Times
about the Arts Council of Great Britain.

1952

28 January, on the cover of
Life
magazine.

3 March,
Chiaroscuro
published by Jonathan Cape (by Pellerini & Cudahy in United States).

5 March, appointed Vice-President of the Artists’ Benevolent Institution.

28 March, Guest of Honour at Foyle’s Literary Lunch: ‘I am two people instead of one: the one you see before you is the old painter. But another one has just cropped up – the young writer.’

October, Introduction to the catalogue of Ulrica Forbes Exhibition, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool.

1953

Resigns as President of Royal Society of Portrait Painters.

Begins sculpture with Fiore de Henriques.

1954

March–April, Royal Academy, Diploma Gallery: Exhibition of Works by Augustus John OM, RA (460 exhibits). Portrait of Lord Leverhulme repaired. Walker Art Gallery: Exhibition of Augustus John pictures with Liverpool associations.

November, Nuffield House, Guy’s Hospital, prostate gland operation.

December (till March 1955), Spain.

1955

February, ‘Some Portraits from Memory’ published by the
London
Magazine.

March, bronze head of Yeats purchased for the Abbey Theatre, Dublin.

19 September, letter to
The Times
on the rights of gypsies.

November, Wales. Drawings of John Cowper Powys.

1956

August, France.

September, Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield: Paintings (43), Drawings (88) and Prints (15).

1957

4 November, interviewed by Malcolm Muggeridge on BBC TV
Panorama:
‘Have you always wanted to be a painter?’ ‘Give me another hundred years and I would become a very good one.’

December,
Fifty-two Drawings,
with an Introduction by Lord David Cecil, published by Rainbird.

1958

Joins British Peace Committee.

1959

29 October, given the Honorary Freedom of Tenby.

1960

Elected first president of the Contemporary Art Society for Wales.

4 January, eighty-second birthday. ‘Work as usual’
(Daily Telegraph).

12 May, interviewed by John Freeman on BBC
Face to Face
television programme.

14 October, letter praising the work of Matthew Smith in the
Daily Telegraph.

1961

15 March–30 March, Tooth’s Gallery: Paintings and Drawings not previously illustrated.

31 October, dies at Fryern Court.

5 November, obituary programme, BBC TV
Monitor.

1962

20 July, Christie’s first studio sale.

Augustus John
by John Rothenstein published by Beaverbrook Newspapers Ltd.

1963

21 June, Christie’s second studio sale.

1964

12 November,
Finishing Touches
published by Jonathan Cape.

1965

1–30 April, Upper Grosvenor Galleries: Loan Exhibition of Drawings and Murals by Augustus John OM, RA, in aid of the Augustus John Memorial Appeal.

1967

The Drawings of Augustus John
,
with an Introduction by Stephen Long-street, published by the Borden Publishing Company, California.

1 October, memorial statue by Ivor Roberts-Jones unveiled by Lord Mountbatten at Fordingbridge.

1968

18 July, Harlech Television,
Augustus John
programme.

1969

24 July, Dorelia dies at Fryern Court.

1970

25 October–14 November, The University of Hull: ‘Augustus John: Portraits of the Artist’s Family’.

1971

2–28 December, Lefevre Gallery: Drawings by Augustus John (36 pictures).

1972

Over 1,000 drawings, no paintings and 3 bronzes, the last remains of the artist’s studio, purchased by the National Museum of Wales.

November, Dalhousie Art Gallery, Halifax, Nova Scotia: Augustus John (40 pictures, catalogue by Ernest W. Smith).

1974

September, Malcolm Easton and Michael Holroyd,
The Art of Augustus John
published. Colnaghi’s: ‘Augustus John: Early Drawings and Etchings’ (162 exhibits, catalogue essays by Malcolm Easton and Michael Holroyd).

October, London Weekend Television
Aquarius
programme,
Augustus John,
with Richard Burton (producer, Humphrey Burton).

1975

25 March–31 August, National Portrait Gallery, London: ‘Augustus John, Paintings and Drawings’.

30 May–26 October, National Portrait Gallery, London: ‘Augustus John. Life and Times’ (catalogues for both exhibitions by Malcolm Easton and Romilly John).

1978

15 April–21 May, National Museum of Wales Centenary exhibition, ‘Augustus John: Studies for Compositions’ (catalogue by A. D. Fraser Jenkins).