About this artwork
This one of the last paintings Piper made in an abstract style, and is also one of his largest works. The painting clearly refers to the cubist compositions of Braque and Picasso, and is closely related to a mural Piper did for a friend's flat in Highgate, London, in 1938. The abstracted motifs represented in this picture are a bottle and a stringed instrument. The reference to the sea in the painting's title suggests that it may have originated as a seascape.
Updated before 2020
-
artist:John Piper (1903 - 1992) English
-
title:Black Ground (Screen for the Sea)
-
date created:1938
-
materials:Oil on canvas
-
measurements:121.60 x 182.80 cm; Framed: 127.00 x 188.30 x 12.00 cm / 43.00 kg
-
object type:
-
credit line:Purchased 1978
-
accession number:GMA 1998
-
gallery:
-
subject:
-
artwork photographed by:Antonia Reeve
John Piper
John Piper
Piper was born in Surrey and studied at the Royal College of Art in London from 1926 to 1928. He is best known for his picturesque, architectural and landscape paintings, which are in the romantic tradition of William Blake and Joseph Mallord William Turner. However, during the mid- to late-1930s...
