£1,000
Contemporary & Post-War Art | 595
Auction: 16 April 2020 at 12:00 BST
Lithograph, inscribed and dated in plate
Biography: William Scott was born in Greenock, Scotland, in 1913. In 1924, his family moved to his father’s hometown in Northern Ireland, where Scott began art classes with a local teacher. Four years later, he enrolled at the Belfast School of Art, and later moved to London to study at the Royal Academy Schools, initially in the sculpture department before moving to painting.
In May 1937, Scott married fellow student Mary Lucas. That same year they travelled to Italy and France and established an art school in Pont-Aven with the painter Geoffrey Nelson. In 1938, Scott exhibited at the Paris Salon d’Automne and was elected Sociétaire.
Scott and his family returned to the UK just days before the outbreak of the Second World War. Scott joined the army in July 1942 but continued to paint and to exhibit during the war both in group and solo shows. After the war, Scott became Senior Painting Master at the Bath Academy of Art, at Corsham Court, Wiltshire. During this time, he frequently travelled to Cornwall and became friends with many of the St Ives Group of artists.
In the 1950s, Scott became interested in Abstract Expressionism during an extended visit to North America, and it was during this time that his own work also moved closer to abstraction. By 1956, Scott’s success as an artist, both nationally and internationally, allowed him to give up full-time teaching.
In 1958, he represented Great Britain at the Venice Biennale, and also exhibited at the 1961 São Paulo Bienal, where Scott won the Sanbra (International Critics) Purchase Prize.
Major retrospectives of his work have been held in Zurich, Hannover, Berne, Dublin and Belfast and in 1972, the Tate held an exhibition of more than 125 of his paintings dating from as early as 1938. In 1963 Scott took up a 12-month residency in Berlin and, in 1966, in recognition of his contribution to the arts, he was made a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in the New Year’s Honours List. He subsequently received honorary doctorates from the Royal College of Art in London, Queen’s University Belfast and Trinity College Dublin. In 1984 Scott was elected a Royal Academician.