Or save it to favorites and we'll tell you if this item goes on sale!
- Get the Chairish App
- to view in your space
James Tower 1919 - 1988. English. Still Life of Flowers in a Jug and a Bowl of Apples, 1944. Framed Wartime Watercolor Painting.
- Get the Chairish App
- to view in your space
Details
Description
James Tower.
English ( b.1919 - d.1988 ).
Still Life of Flowers in a Jug and a Bowl of Apples, …
more
James Tower.
English ( b.1919 - d.1988 ).
Still Life of Flowers in a Jug and a Bowl of Apples, 1944
Watercolor & Ink.
Signed & Dated.
Image size 11.4 inches x 13.2 inches ( 29cm x 33.5cm ).
Frame size 18.1 inches x 19.7 inches ( 46cm x 50cm ).
Available for sale from Big Sky Fine Art in the English county of Dorset, this original wartime painting is by the English ceramic artist James Tower and is dated 1944.
The watercolor is presented and supplied in a sympathetic contemporary frame (which is shown in these photographs), mounted using new conservation materials and behind non-reflective Artglass AR 70™glass.
This vintage painting is in good condition, commensurate with its age. The painting is now preserved for future adoration and is ready to hang and to be appreciated.
The watercolor is signed and dated upper right.
One of Britain’s most important 20th-century ceramic artists; a quintessentially English sculptor, painter and teacher who was dedicated to his craft.
James Tower was born on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent, and brought up in a landscape of tidal estuaries, reeds, fish, shells and patterns of water on sand that greatly influenced his later work. He had a childhood accident that blinded him in one eye.
He left home at 17 and decided to travel the world, eventually making his way to the South Seas. On his return, he studied painting at the Royal Academy, (1938-40), and his talent was recognised when he won the Gold Medal for Painting in 1939.
During the Second World War he enrolled for service and spent the war working in camouflage and mapping at the Polish Ministry of Information. He married fellow student Maureen McManus in 1944. After the war he returned to art, enrolling at the Slade School of Art in 1946. Here he attended Dora Billington’s classes and became fascinated with ceramics. After he graduated, he took further classes in the medium at the London Institute under the British potter William Newland.
In 1949 Tower was invited to set up a ceramics course at the progressive Bath Academy, Corsham. Here he became a celebrated teacher, setting up Pottery in old stables at Beechfield, and taught all aspects of ceramics including technology, taking students on local excavations. He established a diverse artistic environment, teaching and working alongside artists such as Terry Frost, Kenneth Armitage, William Scott and Peter Lanyon. Surrounded by such individualistic and impassioned artists, Tower began to develop his own unique approach to ceramics. His work was characterised by an emphasis on abstract; organic forms and painterly surfaces, evoking notions of nature, particularly foliage, water and the landscape. In 1963 he won a Leverhulme Research Award for terracotta research. Tower remained in post at Bath until 1964.
In 1966 he became Head of Fine Art at Brighton College of Art, where he set up a sculpture course and remained in post until 1986.
As a sculptor and ceramicist Tower is known for his domestic pottery, terracotta sculpture and large glazed forms. He often used the sea as a motif in his work, using wave patterns to create a sense of movement, and his textured surfaces are reminiscent of shells and crustaceans.
Tower had his first exhibition with fashionable Gimpel Fils, London, in 1951, and many others followed there. His work, including paintings and drawings, was included in ‘Corsham A Celebration’, at the Victoria Art Gallery, Bath, 1988-9 and tour, and his solo exhibitions included the Gardner Centre, University of Sussex, 1967, and America at Art Latitude, New York, 1979. During the 1960s 3 of his works were exhibited at the Royal Academy.
Tower was something of a perfectionist and often destroyed works that did not satisfy him, so his oeuvre is relatively modest. His paintings are much rarer than his sculptures.
He lived the latter part of his life outside Lewes in East Sussex, - a landscape of sea views, chalk downs, streams, cliffs and flinty fields, that continued to influence his work. He died in Sussex in 1988. He was described posthumously by Antony Gormley as “a wonderful artist, father and teacher…always interested in the inner life of people, places and things and he has left behind a body of work that celebrates this.”
A comprehensive biography and catalogue of his work was published in 2012, Ceramic Art of James Tower, by Timothy Wilcox, and this is now accepted as the standard source of reference to his work.
Tower’s career was pioneering in that he pushed boundaries and intertwined art and ceramics in a way which was at the time quite rare. There was a major retrospective of Tower’s work at the Victoria at Art gallery in Bath in 2019, to coincide with the centenary of his birth.
Today, Tower’s artwork is held in many prestigious public and private collections. Examples can be seen in the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, the Museum of Modern Art in New York and The Art Institute of Chicago.
© Big Sky Fine Art
This is an original watercolour painting by English ceramics artist, sculptor and teacher James Tower. It is signed and dated 1944, which is a period when he would have been still working as part of the war effort, shortly before he resumed his formal art studies. The painting is a still life, depicting a tall, rounded jug with a bunch of loose flowers, and a bowl with four apples, on a tabletop. Behind there is a broad vertical wooden beam and an interior wall. Even as this early stage in his artistic career there is a certain style, a sense of a real understanding of form and dimension, and a clear interest in ceramics. The palette is muted and warm, giving this painting an autumnal feel.
We provide a professional shipping and delivery service on this particular painting which is free to customers in the UK, Europe, USA and Canada. We can also provide other worldwide delivery on any purchase. Please contact us for further information.
less
- Dimensions
- 19.7ʺW × 0.5ʺD × 18.1ʺH
- Art Subjects
- Still Life
- Frame Type
- Framed
- Period
- Mid 20th Century
- Country of Origin
- United Kingdom
- Item Type
- Vintage, Antique or Pre-owned
- Materials
- Paper
- Pen and Ink
- Pottery
- Watercolor
- Condition
- Good Condition, Original Condition Unaltered, Some Imperfections
- Color
- Red
- Condition Notes
- Good. The watercolor is presented and supplied in a sympathetic contemporary frame (which is shown in these photographs), mounted using … moreGood. The watercolor is presented and supplied in a sympathetic contemporary frame (which is shown in these photographs), mounted using new conservation materials and behind non-reflective Artglass AR 70™glass. This vintage painting is in good condition, commensurate with its age. A couple of creases have been virtually eliminated under a heated press but are just visible under closer scrutiny. The painting is now preserved for future adoration and is ready to hang and be appreciated. less
Need more product details?
Shipping Options
Standard Returns & Cancellations
Return Policy - All sales are final 48 hours after delivery, unless otherwise specified in the description of the product.
Extended Return for Trade
- Expands return window for trade members to 14 days (12 days more than our standard return policy)
- Trade member to notify Chairish of intent to return within 14 days of item delivery
- Buyer refunded item cost. Buyer pays return shipping cost
- Does not apply to damages that occur post-delivery
Questions about the item?
Related Collections
- Mughal Paintings
- Lemon Paintings
- Alice Ford Paintings
- Beeswax Paintings
- Post Impressionist Paintings
- English Country Home Paintings
- Earthenware Paintings
- Lucia Jones Paintings
- Kinetic Paintings
- Sir Edwin Henry Landseer Paintings
- Dibond Paintings
- Amedeo Clemente Modigliani Paintings
- Haley Mathewes Paintings
- Photogram Paintings
- Styrofoam Paintings
- Figural Paintings
- Kristi Kohut Paintings
- Paintings in Nantucket
- Robert Motherwell Paintings
- Martha Angus Paintings
- Lee Reynolds Paintings
- Mid-Century Modern Paintings
- Paintings in Dallas
- Oil Paintings
- Portrait Paintings
Returns
- Does not arrive
- Is broken during transit
- Is entirely different than what you purchased
- Some made-to-order items and a limited selection of other items (noted as non-refundable in the returns and cancellations section of the product description)
-
Orders where Free Local Pickup or Seller Managed Local Delivery were selected:
- Upon inspection, If you decide not to move forward with the purchase, you or your agent must refuse the item at the time of pickup/delivery from the seller
- Once you have taken possession of the item, all sales are final
- International, cross-border returns may require different processes depending on the countries between which the item is shipping to/from, and the buyer is responsible and duties (if applicable, on cross-border orders).
- On approved returns, the buyer is responsible for the full cost of return packing and shipping.
Cancellations
- Prior to shipping or local pickup, buyers may cancel an order for any reason, with the exception of some Made-to-Order items, where supplies have been purchased or work begun on the item.
- Please notify us within 24 hours of purchase if you would like to cancel an order, as prompt cancellation will reduce the likelihood that you will incur return shipping charges.
- Once shipping or pickup has been initiated, the cancellation will be considered a return and you will be responsible for the cost of shipping.
Shipping
Note: Made-to-Order items typically include a lead time or custom delivery window that is added to the delivery time.
- Chairish Express In-Home Delivery
- Chairish Express In-Home deliveries are currently only offered for international cross-border shipments.
- The item will be delivered to your home and placed in the desired room. The delivery service includes unpacking, inspecting, and removing packaging materials; and does not include installation or setting up the item.
- Shipping charges start at $999 and vary based on the size, weight, packaging, and/or the value of the item.
- Deliveries can take anywhere from 6 to 9 weeks to be delivered.
- Chairish Freight Delivery
- Delivered in a crate, to your front door.
- You will need tools and/or equipment to open the crate.
- Shipping charges start at $799 and vary based on the size, weight, packaging, and/or the value of the item.
- Chairish Freight deliveries can take anywhere from 4 to 8 weeks.
- Only available in selected markets.
- Chairish In-Home Delivery
- The item will be delivered to your home and placed in the desired room. The delivery service includes unpacking, inspecting, and removing packaging materials; and does not include installation or setting up the item.
-
Shipping charges start at $149 and based on the size and the distance between pickup and delivery
(for approximate values see table):
Delivery Type Within 50 miles radius Within 1,500 miles radius Over 1,500 miles radius International Cross-Border Shipping Price $149 - $299 $199 - $799 $449 - $899 Over $899 Transit Time 2 to 4 weeks 3 to 6 weeks 4 to 8 weeks 12 to 17 weeks - For some items, the shipping price may vary depending on the size, weight, material and/or value of the item.
- Free Local Pickup
- Local pickup allows customers to inspect an item at the time of pickup and avoid shipping costs.
- Following purchase, a confirmation email is sent to the email address associated with the order, and includes: Pickup Verification & Seller's contact information
- Please contact the seller within 5 days to coordinate pickup
- Once the item has been picked up (by you or your representative) it cannot be returned or refunded.
- Free Shipping
- Free shipping may be offered on select listings.
- Smaller items are typically delivered within 2 weeks of the purchase date, while larger items and furniture may take up to 6 weeks for delivery.
- When an item with Free Shipping is returned, the cost of return shipping fees will be charged to the buyer.
- Parcel Delivery
- Shipment is arranged through recognized carriers such as UPS, FedEx, and DHL.
- Only pieces that can be safely packed in a box or envelope may be shipped via parcel.
- Shipping charges start at $9 — and vary based on the size, weight, packaging and the value of the item.
Delivery Type US Domestic International Cross-Border Shipping Price $9 - $99 $39 - $499 Transit Time 1 to 2 weeks 2 to 4 weeks - Seller Managed Delivery
- Shipping is offered and managed by the seller, through a shipper of the seller’s choice.
- Available on items at the seller’s discretion.
- Seller Managed Local Delivery
- Local curbside delivery is offered and managed by the seller, within a limited geography.
- Following purchase, a confirmation email is sent to the confirmation email address associated with the order, and includes: Pickup Verification Code & Seller’s contact information
- Please contact the seller within 5 days to coordinate delivery.
The Chairish Buyer Guarantee
Make an Offer
Fees and shipping costs will be calculated in the next step
Have questions about how offers work? Learn more or .