Lot 424
ROGER FRY (1866-1934) FOR OMEGA WORKSHOPS
PAIR OF PAINTED DINING CHAIRS, CIRCA 1913
Auction: 3 April 2019 at 12:00 BST
Description
painted in pale grey, the arched toprail pierced with nine roundels above caned seat, back and arms on square legs, bears maker's marks (2)
Dimensions
45cm wide, 109cm high, 41cm deep
Footnote
Provenance: Lady Dorothy Wellesley, Penns-in-the-Rocks
Literature: The Studio, August 1930, pp. 142/3
Anscombe, Isabelle 'Omega and After: Bloomsbury and the Decorative Arts', London, 1981, pp. 134/5, fig. 39
Note: Duncan Grant and Vanessa Bell carried on their decorative work through the twenties, developing and in many ways drawing on their earlier Omega experience. The Omega Workshops, which had been set up to execute the group's designs had been closed in 1919 but the Omega spirit continued to flourish. The chairs in the current lot were part of a 1929 project by the Omega Interior Design Company for the dining room at Penns-in-the-Rocks, home of Lady Dorothy Wellesley. Grant later recalled it as 'the best thing we did' and the commission was well-received and featured in the Studio magazine of 1930. It was there described to be an 'effect...of iridescence', with six large painted panels alternating with rectangles of colour amidst tones of pale grey and green.