Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/130999
Benbecula, 1962 Gouache on paper 49 x 61.5 cm; 19 ¼ x 24 ½ in William Scott Foundation Archive no. 2320 Provenance: The archive of Stanley Jones, the master lithographer. Exhibitions: Stanley Jones and the Curwen Studio, Osborne Samuel, 2011 Both this and Mingulay (illustrated on the following page) are gouaches which are studies for a series of five lithographs Scott made at the Curwen Studio with the master lithographer Stanley Jones between 1960 and 1963. The idea for a series of lithographs of Scottish islands was that of Timothy Simon of the Curwen Press to commemorate the launching of Curwen Prints, the gallery part of the Press. The idea for the project was first mooted in St Ives, Cornwall in the late 1950s when Scott first met Jones who had been dispatched there to run a pilot project for a Curwen print studio based on the Paris print ateliers. Scott at the time was teaching at the Bath Academy of Art at Corsham Court and was a regular visitor to St Ives and its artist community. He worked on the gouaches in the studio in Plaistow, east London. According to Stanley Jones, Scott arrived with a variety of sketches for the island series and as the project developed he became excited by the potential tonalities from lithographic stone. He was already familiar with the lithographic process having made prints at the Royal College of Art in the early 1950s. The initial designs were formally worked out on paper and painted in gouache, layer upon layer, quite differently from his usual working method, which helped him determine what he called his 'structural ideas' for working on the lithographic stones. Jones advised him on how best to achieve this. The collaboration allowed him to create the now famous lithographs and led to these exceptional gouaches 32