Portrait of Joseph Brewer
About this artwork
Joseph Brewer was secretary to the editor of The Spectator magazine, for which the artist worked as art critic from 1923 to 1926. The vivid colours, metallic sheen and sculptural, robotic forms are typical of McCance's work of this period. In the early 1920s he began to schematize the human body, stripping it of detail, until it acquired a machine-like appearance. Many of McCance's paintings and drawings show figures reading, which may reflect his own work as a writer, his keen intellectual spirit and his interest in book design.
Updated before 2020
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artist:William McCance (1894 - 1970) Scottish
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title:Portrait of Joseph Brewer
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date created:1925
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materials:Oil on canvas
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measurements:Framed: 84.80 x 69.60 x 6.20 cm
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object type:
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credit line:Purchased 1989
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accession number:GMA 3446
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gallery:
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depicted:
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subject:
William McCance
William McCance
McCance was born in a suburb of Glasgow and studied at Glasgow School of Art from 1911-5. In 1918 he married a fellow student, Agnes Miller Parker (one of Britain's leading wood-engravers), and they moved to London two years later. In the early 1920s McCance developed a machine-inspired, near...