July 7th 2023. ON THIS DAY.
In 92 years of her existence, one can primarily call Dame Laura Knight an astute observer. Be it working women, circus performers, ballet dancers or her own portraits as a painter. Dame Laura Knight art works were chiefly dominated by the marginalised folks which included circus performers, gipsies, Romani people and of course women. And why wouldn’t an artist with an unstable childhood filled with numerous traumatic instances not relate with those whose struggles are unspoken for? Not only was she- famous for her oils, watercolours, engravings, etchings and drypoint- the first woman artist of the British Empire to be granted the title of Dame, but she was also the first to hold a solo exhibition at the Royal Academy and the second to be elected as a Royal Academician.
Courtesy Art History
As Rebecca Anthony once said, “ She [Knight] painted women as they are and not how men wanted them to be”. This is why when we look at Laura Knight’s paintings at the Cornwall beach, we see no men. Anthony describes it as deeply psychological, since at the time of this very painting, the men are absent because they are all “fighting and dying in the trenches” of war. It was also at a very similar location- the Lamorna beach- when Knight welcomed models to paint naked on the beach. This was at the time when women were not allowed to paint nude etchings.
Courtesy: National Portrait Gallery
We were fortunate in having only ourselves to cater for…Fortunate, too, that vain show and fashionable display did not mean anything to either of us; all we wanted was time free to work — the greatest pleasure in the world.’
-Dame Laura Knight
Having grown up in a household with a father who abandoned them, a mother and an elder sister who passed away a few years later, it is no surprise that Knight found solace in the instability of the travelling folks of gipsies and circus performers. It was in the mid-20s when Knight joined the WAAC (War Artists Advisory Committee) for whom she depicted -the much underrepresented- women during the war as factory girls, switchboard operators etc.
Courtesy: Wikipedia
It is said that Knight was a painter that embraced Realism and Impressionism. Both of which are chalantly present in Laura Knight prints and works. The exhibition of her painting in the Royal Academy included 250 of her artworks, which was a first for a woman at that time. In 1970, on this day, July 7th Dame Laura Knight Passed mere three days before her exhibition at the Nottingham Art Gallery and Museum.
References
1. Christies- Dame Laura Knight: the artist who declared, ‘I paint today’
2. The Guardian- The life less ordinary of artist Laura Knight
Vaishnavi Srivastava is a learning writer, a keen researcher and a literature enthusiast. She is a Sub-editor at Abir Pothi.
