Gerald Leslie Brockhurst (British 1890-1978) §
Adolescence (Kathleen Nancy Woodward), 1932 (Fletcher 75)
Auction: 27 October 2023 from 11:00 BST
Description
signed in pencil (in the margin lower right), from the unnumbered edition of 90, etching on wove paper
Dimensions
plate 26.5cm x 37cm (10 1/2in x 14 3/4in); sheet 33.6cm x 45.6cm (131/4in x 17 7/8in), unframed
Footnote
Adolescence is the most famous and virtuoso image of Brockhurst’s career and is widely considered a masterpiece of twentieth-century printmaking.
Having shown early promise and commitment to his studies, Brockhurst enrolled at Birmingham School of Art aged just twelve years old. He later entered the Royal Academy Schools in London in 1907. Brockhurst’s trajectory to success was set early on, as in both schools he was awarded many of their highest accolades. After travel in France and Italy before the outbreak of World War One, followed by a five-year period spent living in Ireland, Brockhurst eventually re-settled in the English capital. Over the course of the 1920s he made his name in artistic circles, foremost as an outstanding printmaker at this point in time, while his reputation as a painter of extraordinary skill would come to fruition a decade later.
Adolescence is rightly regarded as a significant artistic achievement. In 1924, Hugh Stokes encapsulated the artist’s technique as follows: ‘What…[Brockhurst]…is gradually attaining… is a soft and velvety richness of quality in which line disappears, although the form is based upon line.’ It is a startling process which results in a remarkable level of finesse. Brockhurst’s ability to convey such an extraordinary variety of texture and tone in Adolescence make it a prized work among collectors, as too does its period elegance and subtle sensuality.
As with many of history’s great artworks, the backstory can add as much appeal for collectors as can the aesthetics of the image itself. Adolescence is one such example of this. Brockhurst had attracted scandal (with the added benefit of renown) due to his affair with Kathleen Woodward, a 16-year-old life model for whom he subsequently left his wife and former muse Anaïs Folin. In the manner of his friend Augustus John, Brockhurst re-christened Kathleen ‘Dorette’, and she came to feature in many of his most successful and notable portraits. In Adolescence, Dorette is depicted seated nude on her bed, assessing herself in a dressing-table mirror, lost in her interior world. It is an idealisation of young womanhood, a subject that preoccupied much of Brockhurst’s career, but it is also a study of nascent sexuality. It remains Brockhurst’s most overtly sensual image.