Figure and Rhythm:
Leon Underwood
Introduction
Leon Underwood (1890 - 1975) was a painter,
sculptor, draughtsman, printmaker, author
and teacher. His passion, inventiveness and
versatility fuelled his creativity which seemed to
know no bounds.
Underwood was fascinated by the human figure
and explored ways to represent the threedimensionality of its form through various media.
He especially tried to capture qualities of rhythm
and movement as perceived in dance and music.
“All the arts are direct linear descendants from
the ancient forerunner dancing, in which the self
(the body) is thrown into expressive attitudes”1
His work was greatly influenced by indigenous
art, cultures and landscapes from outside the
Western European canon, which he encountered
at first hand in Iceland, New York, Mexico
and West Africa. He was a restless figure, as
evidenced not only by his adventurous spirit
but in his readiness to challenge received ideas
and conventions of tradition and style. This
independent streak, his complex philosophies
and maverick stance often meant that he was
at times isolated from the mainstream. But his
energy and gifts as a teacher had a significant
influence on his students - some of the most
gifted artists of the inter-war generation including Eileen Agar, Blair Hughes-Stanton and
Henry Moore.
Alfred Cracknell, Photograph of Leon Underwood with
Mexican Love Song, 1930, Courtesy Courtauld Institute
Although his artistic style was constantly
evolving the central theme to which Underwood
remained devoted throughout his career, was the
human figure. As he discovered new materials
and techniques he would frequently rework an
earlier subject or motif to explore the qualities
that a new medium could bring to its form and
interpretation. For example, the figure of The
Fishwife which first appears in a coloured linocut
print, is later carved in walnut, then cast in
bronze. The Diver is first rendered as a woodengraving and later transformed into a sculpture.
Underwood’s interest in indigenous art and his
subsequent travels were prompted by a desire
to better understand primitive cultures. He
wanted to discover how subject was linked to
form and the motives of the peoples who created
sculptural works. His visit to Altamira, Spain in
1925 had led him to consider the compositional
mechanics of the cave drawings – he saw the
contours not as outlines but as axial points
which conveyed a sense of movement and
momentum. Dimensionality and rhythm were
created by shadow. Underwood coined the term
The shifts in focus and style also reflected
imagery that Underwood encountered on his
travels and the ideas and beliefs that arose
out of his engagement with other cultures. All
these influences informed the way in which he
approached his work.
1
‘axial rhythm’ which became a key tenet of all his
figurative work as he explored ways of rendering
the solid mass of a figure on paper as well as in a
three-dimensional, sculptural form.
He also considered the notion of ‘cycles of style’
whereby scientific discovery generates new
technology, which in turn changes forms of
representation. He writes that “The transition
of style in all ages runs on comparable circuits of
science, art, technology, and religion.”2
Underwood was a prolific writer and he espoused
his ideas on the relationship between art and life,
ideals of beauty, the ritual power of ‘aura’ and the
consequences for indigenous artistic expression
when different cultures collided, in various
illustrated publications. These included the review
‘The Island’, his article ‘Art for Heaven’s Sake’ and
a trilogy of books on West African Masks, Figures
in Wood and Bronzes.
The following notes offer an overview of Leon
Underwood the artist through works that he
produced at each stage of his artistic journey.
They trace his career as a figurative artist as
it developed through the different techniques
he mastered. Each section focuses on a single
work in a specific medium: drawing and painting,
etching, wood-engraving, linocut and sculpture,
its subject matter and the events that influenced
the transition from one form to another.
Words in this pack which are underlined refer
to the References and Connection sections
on pages 21 to 23.
Elijah’s Meat, 1938 (cast 1970), Bronze, Edition of seven,
Private collection, Location: Room 5
2
Drawing and Painting
U
nderwood was a fine draughtsman and
drawing from life was fundamental to his
approach. He believed in the ‘life giving force’ of
the figure. The movement and energy that he
captured with his pencil studies or etchings gave
impetus and form to the ‘pure plastic rhythm’
he sought to express in all his work, not least his
later sculptures.
premise of volume rather than contour, to think
about balance and direction. It was a studio
where students were treated as artists, and
where individuality and experimentation were
encouraged. Underwood’s influence however
was so strong that in spite of this liberal attitude,
it was his methods that inevitably came to
dominate the outlook of those around him, above
all in life drawing.4
Armed with a sound understanding of anatomy
Underwood’s concern when drawing was how
to render the hidden layers of muscle which
gave the figure its dynamic form. He wanted
to suggest mass by linear means without
simply drawing an outline. In early figurative
paintings Underwood frequently found his
subject in groups of people working together
on a common task. In Erecting a Camouflage
Tree ,1919, he depicts a group of men working
on the construction of a camouflage tree. They
are stripped to the waist and the exertions of
manual labour, the contortions of their bodies,
the tension and leverage are clearly conveyed
through the musculature of the body. Although a
little stilted, the painting shows the early stages
of a visual language that Underwood would
continue to develop and refine.3
In 1920, within a year of completing his own
studies at the Slade, Underwood joined the staff
at the Royal College of Art (RCA) as assistant
teacher of life drawing. His unorthodox approach
to teaching was often in conflict with established
‘art school’ training but welcomed by his students
eager in the inter-war years for new forms of
expression. When he later resigned from his
post some of his former students, including
Henry Moore, asked him to continue giving them
evening classes at his own recently opened
Brook Green School of Drawing. In addition,
other students such as Eileen Agar found their
way to Brook Green on the recommendation of
Henry Tonks from the Slade and remained core
members of what would became a close and
dedicated cohort.
Study for Venus in Kensington Gardens: Nude (Kitty Malone),
1921, Pencil on paper, Collection of Lord Archer and Dame
Mary Archer DBE, Location: Room 1
Working from life models was central to
Underwood’s teaching. Brook Green students
became adept at shorter poses working swiftly
to draw the body in movement, to work from a
3
1: Drawing and Painting
Venus in Kensington Gardens, 1921
Oil on canvas
Collection of Lord Archer and Dame Mary Archer DBE, Location: Room 1
For his first major painting Underwood brings his individual life studies out of the studio and into the
public sphere. His wife, friends and students became the models for the main characters in this colourful,
complex composition; a whirl of artistic and social wit. It is a composition built up from careful pencil and
chalk studies, with each pose studied from two or three angles before finding its place in the scene.
There are references to the café scenes of the Impressionists at ‘Tuileries’, ‘Moulin de la Galette’ and
Renoir’s painting Luncheon of the Boating Party. With a certain panache Underwood demonstrates his
thorough grasp of the belle peinture of his training. It is a stylish nod to an era past and a signal that he
was now heading off on a different road.5
Venus in Kensington Gardens is, above all, Underwood’s Dejeuner sur l’herbe and gained similar
notoriety to Manet’s canvas. It was greeted with equal measures of outrage - “To seat a woman in her
birthday suit among the correctly-attired frequenters of the tea house in a London Park is a departure
from civilised conventions for which it is difficult to find a reason” - and quiet amusement.6 Like Manet,
Underwood presents his life model, Kitty Malone, nude but surrounded by clothed contemporaries. An
original study for this figure can be seen on page three.
Key elements
• The circular rhythm formed by the characters
at the central table is echoed by groups in the
background to the right and left, creating a
harmonious sweep to the composition.7 They
almost appear to revolve around the man
standing at the hub, as if on a carousel.
• The figure of ‘Venus’ is a frequent motif in
Underwood’s work, through which he explored
ideals of beauty. Following his travels to West
Africa she reappears in Birth of Venus Africana,
first as an Ink and watercolour on paper (1949)
and then as a Linocut (1950). In the sculpture
Forty Thousand Years (c.1960) Underwood
comments on changing aesthetic ideals,
expressed through a Giacometti-esque figure that
gazes down on a plump Venus of Willendorf .8
• Seated with ‘Venus’ at the central table are
other characters associated with the school:
Mary Underwood (Underwood’s wife) in a
hat and red dress; Clement Cowles, involved
with original plans for Brook Green School, in
a brown suit and hat; Arthur Outlaw, friend
and enthusiastic supporter, with his hand on
his chin.
• Compare the pencil study for Venus in
Kensington Gardens: Nude (Kitty Malone),
1921 with the final image in the painting.
• Compare Underwood’s Venus in Kensington
• In the background, on the left wearing a tie is
Gardens with Manet’s Dejeuner sur l’herbe both are making statements about past artistic
and stylistic conventions and advocating new
forms of expression.
Warren J. Vinton; the two women at the extreme
top on the right are students Eileen Agar and
Jessie Aliston Smith; and leaning back in his chair
to the right of Kitty – Underwood himself.
4
5
Etching
An Etching is a print made from a flat metal plate. To make the printing plate
the metal is coated with a thin layer of greasy wax called ground. An image is
drawn into the ground with a sharp point. The sharp point scratches through
the ground and exposes the shiny metal beneath. The metal plate is put into
a tray of acid. The acid eats away at the drawn lines to create indented lines,
the ground protects the rest of the plate. This process is called biting the
plate. The etched plate is inked all over, the ink is then wiped off the surface
of the metal, leaving ink only in the indented lines. Damp paper is placed on
top of the plate and then printed using an etching press. The damp paper
picks up the ink from the indented lines to make the print.
U
nderwood had learned etching at the RCA (1910-1913). Returning home after the war he picked
it up again with great enthusiasm. He installed a printing press in his studio and in a flurry of activity
between 1921-22 he produced a remarkable body of etchings considered by his biographer Christopher
Neve 9 as ‘unsurpassed of their kind in the period immediately after the War’. At Brook Green life drawing
extended into printmaking and Underwood and his students worked together to master the discipline.10
For Underwood, the technique of etching offered another way of exploring the figure in its dimensional
state. It is, as Whitworth11 observes an intaglio process and, as such, is akin to carving. The bite of the
acid into the surface of the plate is an action somewhat analogous to that of the sculptor’s chisel.’
One of the first prints from this period was a rhythmic group composition The Three Graces ,1921,
a classical study of idealised beauty. He completed several portraits, notable for their delicate touch,
characterisation and compelling sense of presence. They include a street musician The Banjoist, 1921,
and a portrait of Mukul Dey, 1921 – a painter-etcher who attended the school. The print that more
than any other, finally brought Underwood praise as a printmaker and artistic recognition was his own
Self portrait with Landscape, 1921.
During this intense period dedicated for the
most part to etching, Underwood abandoned the
studio for a summer break and headed for a spell
in the country. He enjoyed a taste of the simpler
life and explored his passion for the human
figure, in its rural environment. His confidence
and skill were now at a level that allowed him to
work quickly, often directly onto the plate, eager
not to let an idea or image escape before he got
it down. His portrait of Granny Ashdown, 1922
stands out as a fine example of an etching from
this time. She sat for him patiently on a milking
stool in the open air.12
A later studio portrait is of Clement Cowles,
1922. Here Underwood reproduces almost
exactly the pose in which Cowles had appeared
in the painting Venus in Kensington Gardens. It is
a strong and poignant etching that attains a level
of excellence that suggests that in this medium
too, Underwood had now reached his apogee
and is ready to move on to new challenges13 The Three Graces, 1921, Drypoint on paper, Private
collection, Location: Landing
6
Etching
Self Portrait with a Landscape, 1921
Etching
Mukul Dey, 1921
Drypoint on paper
Key elements
Key elements
• It depicts the artist in the act of sketching, in
• Like Underwood in his self portrait Mukul Dey
Private collection, Location: Room 1
Private collection, Location: Room 1
a landscape.
is also looking directly forward, but he appears
to engage the viewer as an equal. It isn’t a
piercing stare, rather one that draws you in,
that invites you consider another point of view.
• This portrait is deliberately designed to exploit
differences of texture and focal depth. The
background landscape that the viewer sees, is
suggestive of the distant softer textures that
the artist might be looking at. These textures
contrast with the bold etched lines of the
central figure.
• During the era of the British Empire such
straightforward portraits of non-western
subjects were rare in British art. This portrait
suggests a change in attitude, a confident
stance of equality, pride and status.
• We focus on the intense concentration of the
• Indian artist Mukul Dey, attended
artist, in communion with his surroundings and
nature. His white knuckles grip the top of the
board. One would dare not disturb him.
Underwood’s school and was later considered
to be a pioneer of drypoint etching in India.
• We can imagine that he is evaluating/weighing
up what he sees and considering how to
render it onto paper.
7
8
Wood Engraving
A Wood Engraving is a print made from a flat block of end grain wood.
End grain means that the wood has been cut across the tree to show the
circular growth rings of the wood. Wood engravings are small scale as
the size is dictated by the width of the tree. To make the printing block
specialist tools called gravers are used to score or engrave the image into
the wood. Gravers have a wooden handle and a sharp fine straight metal
blade which cuts a thin deep line into the wood. Gravers are made with
different shaped blades to create a variety of fine lines and marks. The
engraved block is inked up using a roller. The ink covers the surface of the
block, the engraved lines will not pick up the ink. A sheet of paper is placed
on top of the inked block and pressure is applied to the back of the paper
using a burnishing tool, which is a smooth disk of wood. This allows the
paper to be firmly rubbed or “burnished” to transfer the ink from the small
block to the paper to make the print.
F
rom etching, Underwood moved swiftly to woodcuts and wood engraving and developed these relief
printmaking techniques in parallel with his activities as a sculptor.14 Life drawing, printmaking and
sculpture were by now an organic and evolving process of experimentation. Early bas-relief works such
as The Dance of Salome, 1924 or Torso, 1923 show this cross-fertilisation clearly.
Underwood’s interest in the language of so-called ‘primitive’ cultures and ancient art had already taken
him to Iceland and in 1925 he travelled to Spain specifically to visit the Altamira caves. He was deeply
affected by the sophistication of these cave paintings. Studying the compositional mechanics of the
images he saw hidden axial points, rather than outline, suggesting the animals’ supremacy and power
of flight. And, contrary to current thinking that the purpose of the paintings was to capture the spirit
of the animal, Underwood believed that the hunter identified with his quarry. The Bison was the hero
and the pre-historic artist projected himself in the image of the beast. Furthermore, Underwood now
understood that subject matter and the manner in which it was expressed were closely linked to belief
and technology. To pursue this theory he needed to see, historically, what happened when a static tribal
culture met the technical expertise of a developing one; for example in Central America or West Africa.
Enthused by ancient Mexican Art he had seen in the British Museum, he decided to visit Mexico.15 First
however, Underwood went to New York. He arrived in 1926 and earned a living from teaching and book
illustration. Here his experience and talents as a printmaker were sought after by various publishers and
Vanity Fair. The images he produced echoed the frivolous, ‘anything goes’ atmosphere of the Jazz Age.
He also wrote and illustrated his own book Animalia, 1926, with verses and woodcuts inspired by the
characters of various animals and birds, after Apollonaire’s Le Bestiaire ou Cortège d’Orphée.
Much of Underwood’s wood-engraved illustration work created in New York makes a fascinating
contribution to the wider visual culture of the Art-Deco age.16 In return the new rhythms, dance styles
and energy that he experienced would resurface in his later three-dimensional works of the 30s such as
Negro Rhythm, Harlem NY and The Herald of New Day.
A second book The Siamese Cat, was written, illustrated and published in 1927, when he returned to
Britain. It incorporates many of Underwood’s ideas about art, in particular the notion that intuition is
superior to logic.17 The book also discusses the concept of the noble savage.
‘Underwood’s strength as a printmaker was ultimately that he understood the human form, not only
through linear draughtsmanship, but also through the particular insight of the sculptor into positive and
negative space, of how the figure existed in three-dimensional space.’18 9
Wood Engraving
Three Peasants and a Lost Shilling, 1924
Wood-engraving on paper
Woodcutter, c.1925
Wood-engraving on paper
Private collection, Location: Room 1
Nigel & Samantha O’Gorman, Location: Room 1
Key elements
• In this harmonious group of three figures
• Several of Underwood’s prints emphasise
• The graceful smooth-limbed, idealised beauties
• The image of a man wielding an axe is seen
Underwood revisits and develops the motif
of The Three Graces, 1921, one of his first
etchings.
the analogy between the act of woodcutting
or sculpting and wood-engraving, as in this
image of the Woodcutter.
in Underwood’s earlier painting Erecting a
Camouflage Tree, 1919. Compared to the later
wood-engraving the protagonist in the painting
appears more posed, less natural. He stands
with his back to the viewer, axe at the ready.
of his earlier work are replaced by the rhythmic
interaction of these wood-engraved figures.
• The work shows how the artist has adapted
subject to material, technique and tools.
• The figures are draped and the limbs rounded.
• As in Three Peasants and a Lost Shilling,
There are no straight lines, just interlocking
curves and arcs.
Underwood is working his material and
exploring the figure in more sculptural terms.
• The artist is exploring the human figure in
sculptural, primitivising terms.
10
11
Linocut
A Linocut is a print made from a block of linoleum or lino for short. Lino
is a soft, pliable material a little like rubber. To make the printing block an
image is carved into the surface of the lino using linocutting tools called
gouges. Gouges are small chisels which have a wooden handle and a fine
sharp curved metal blade to carve with. Once carved,the lino block is inked
up using a roller. The roller covers the surface of the lino with ink, the areas
of the lino that have been carved away are lower than the surface and will
not pick up the ink. A sheet of paper is placed on top of the inked block.
A dry roller is used to apply pressure to the back of the paper, this helps
transfer the ink from the surface of the block to the paper to make the
print. Linocuts can also be printed using a printing press.
I
n the mid-1930s Underwood ceased producing wood-engravings in any significant quantity and
instead began working with linocuts. These took the place of oil paintings, combining the graphic
qualities of line with vibrant colour. To work out the colour layering and balance, Underwood would
first paint gouache studies and experiment by thinning the inks so that translucent colours could be
rendered. Alternatively, he would paint, rather than roll the inks onto the linoleum so that the print had
the painterly quality of a monoprint.19 Later Underwood employed a white line as a graphic device in
linocuts for delineating the figure, as in Growth of Habitation: The Family, 1942. This echoes the chased
lines that Underwood used in sculptures such as Music in Line (1938) and African Madonna (1935).
A commission to illustrate a book by writer and friend Russell Phillips provided Underwood with the
pretext for a much-anticipated visit to Mexico. Before setting out on the trail, Underwood spent some
time by himself at Chichén Itzá, a Mayan site built around 600 CE which was undergoing excavation at
the time of his visit. He saw first-hand how ancient statues such as the Chaac-Mool functioned within
their religious setting. He was profoundly impressed by the precision of Mayan astrologers and the cultural
refinement of masons and sculptors of the time who achieved, with only the most basic stone tools,
works of remarkable sophistication. In Mexico he found his subject and the paradoxes of a ‘primitive’
culture that would influence and sustain his creativity for the next eleven years. Neve20 points out that
Underwood’s view of Aztec and Mayan civilization was undeniably a romantic one, and the whole journey
was undertaken with an eye for the picturesque.
The two travellers chose to use basic forms of transport, to bring them as close as possible to local
people and their culture. Underwood was enchanted. He learned local fishing skills, rode horses over
the Sierra Madre, sketched market scenes, river life and boats. It was a period of intense observation
during which Underwood kept his own notes and sketched extensively. The drawings and watercolours
he made ‘in situ’ served as a visual repository to be later worked into paintings, prints and carvings;
often working the same source image in different media. The heroes and villains of the conquest were
dramatised into important oil paintings; humble market and street scenes, women bathing, figures
resting during the afternoon siesta became the subject of lively, colourful linocuts. Underwood was also
inspired by the work of Mexican muralists Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco. Figurative subjects
in prints such as Woman and Child Tehuantepec, 1928 and Mexican Water Carrier, 1930 show a clear
debt to the rounded forms of the figures in Rivera’s lithographs.21
12
Linocut
The Fishwife, 1936
Linocut on paper
Fishwife, 1939–44 (cast 1973)
Bronze (cast from black walnut carving)
Private collection, Location: Room 4
Private collection, Location: Room 5
Key elements
• The colour lino print of The Fishwife captures
• Later in 1973, Fishwife was cast in bronze.
all the perceived simplicity of coastal life:
of the wind and sea, food, tradition, survival
and physical work.
• This sculpture echoes not only scenes
Underwood had witnessed in Mexico of
women supporting containers on their head
goods but also the pose of as tribal sculptures
such as an African water-carrier in his
collection of African art.23
• The Fishwife, barefoot, simply dressed, hair
and robes billowing in the wind, stands proudly
gazing out to sea.
• She balances the day’s catch on her hip.
• The figure is assured and poised as she
descends the steps. Her centre of gravity
perfectly balanced. She does not need to look
at her feet.
• In the background, dark clouds, black rocks
and a small craft battered by the wind remind
the viewer of the precarity of this existence.
• The twist of her pelvis is followed through
• Underwood represents the figure in graphic
into the slight curve of the steps that form
the base.
terms that are akin to sculpture.22
13
14
Sculpture
“The soul of sculpture lies in the reality of matter, in the mind’s aspect of it, in its
static instantaneity – a glimpse of eternity”.24
F
rom the 1920s, as Underwood’s interest in so-called ‘primitive art’ and sculptural forms grew, he
began collecting African Carvings. Whilst the collection played a significant role in his own creative
development Underwood never copied directly and was critical of the appropriation of past styles.
Objects from his collection were used as a means to transcend historical and cultural boundaries and to
explore essential aspects of culture.25
As a sculptor Underwood was self-taught, driven by his need to find a way of expressing a third (even
fourth) dimension - beyond what he could achieve as a draughtsman and painter. It was an aspiration
that never left him as he explored his perennial passion, the figure and the rhythm that it embodied,
through different media and materials. Where etching and drypoint had been contiguous with the act of
drawing and an extension of his draughtsmanship and painting, the relief techniques of wood-engraving
and linocutting now fed directly into his work as a sculptor.
At Brook Green, Underwood worked to master materials and techniques alongside his students in an
atmosphere of mutual support and experimentation. It is significant that he attracted students also
eager to break new ground; several of whom, Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth and Gertrude Hermes
included, would themselves make their name as sculptors.
Underwood liked to be in control of the whole process of sculpting, from creating the model to casting.
Therefore many of his pieces are relatively small – attributable to the maximum weight and volume
that he could handle in his studio. He wrote of his appreciation for ‘the rhythm of materials’ - wherein
the material from which the sculpture was made, perfectly expressed its subject. This insight and his
philosophies on art informed the dramatic sculptures he created in the 1930s, such as the optimistic
chased-bronze figure Negro Rhythm, Harlem NY, c.1934 and chased-brass The Herald of a New Day,
1934. They capture the intangible forces and states - energy, power, balance, poise, freedom and
rhythm - that dance, music and physical labour embody.
From 1934 onwards, the driving preoccupation of Underwood’s sculpture was the challenge of
expressing movement in bronze. He strove to release the cast metal from its immobility and launch it
into the fourth dimension - time.26
In 1944 he travelled extensively in West Africa, lecturing for the British Council and assembling his
collection. He made many drawings and watercolours on African themes and later wrote seminal texts
on African Figures in Wood, Masks and Bronzes.
Like the image of Woodcutter, that of The Diver evolved from a wood-engraving (1925) before being
reworked as a sculpted figure in Hopton Wood Stone. Both works illustrate the extent of Underwood’s
instinct and skill for harmonising subject and material. The original quarry source of both the stone and
its name was Hopton Wood, Derbyshire. Subsequently other nearby sites were exploited. Hopton Wood
Stone is typically a relatively fine shelly, creamy-grey limestone. In the inter-war years it became one of
the English stones of choice for eminent artists including Eric Gill, Jacob Epstein, and later, Henry Moore
and Barbara Hepworth.
15
Sculpture
Diver, c.1932
Hopton Wood stone
The Diver, 1925
Wood-engraving on paper
Collection of Lord Archer & Dame Mary Archer DBE
Location: Room 2
Private collection, Location Room 2
Key elements
• In his wood-engraving The Diver, Underwood
• The Diver is replete with potential energy. Its
feet are anchored and knees are braced ready
to thrust the weight of the diver’s body in an
arc forward and upward into space.
creates a narrative, a context.
• The Diver is poised on a ledge, high above the
water. His body is taut, his eyes focused on his
target way below.
• The slight concave of the abdomen, suggests
a drawing of breath, a moment of suspension
before the body extends into full flight.
• We anticipate the moment of impulse when his
knees flex and he springs forward.
• The simple, fluid curves that articulate the
figure echo those of the stone figure Chaac
Mool, the Mayan-Toltec rain god, which
Underwood had seen during his visit to Chichén
Itzá in Mexico, and later used as the subject of
• his painting Chaac-Mool’s Destiny, 1929.
• The shadows that outline the body and the
fringe of lines suggest the natural forces that
will meet and carry the diver’s body as he
leaves terra firma.
16
17
Endnotes
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26
Leon Underwood Sculptural Convictions. First published in the Island, vol.1, no.2, 1931, pp 40–44
Leon Underwood The Cycle of Style in Art, Religion, Science and Technology’, Royal Society of British
Sculptors Annual Report . London: Royal Society of British Sculptors, 1961, pp 22–9
Christopher Neve, Leon Underwood. London: Thames & Hudson, 1974, p.30
Neve 1974, p.46
Neve 1974. p 52
Neve 1974. p 49
Neve 1974. pp 50,52
Simon Martin. Introduction in Leon Underwood : Figure and Rhythm. 2015. Chichester: Pallant House
Gallery p 34
Neve 1974. p 53
Charlotte Stokes. The Brook Green School in Leon Underwood : Figure and Rhythm. 2015.
Chichester: Pallant House Gallery p 42
Ben Whitworth. Sculptural Dimensions In the Early Work Of Leon Underwood in Leon Underwood :
Figure and Rhythm. 2015. Chichester: Pallant House Gallery p 78
Neve 1974. p 66
Neve 1974. p 61
Simon Martin. Making an Impression: Underwood the Printmaker in Leon Underwood : Figure and
Rhythm. 2015. p 62
Neve 1974. pp 88,89
Simon Martin. Making an Impression: Underwood the Printmaker in Leon Underwood : Figure and
Rhythm. 2015. p 63
Simon Martin. Making an Impression: Underwood the Printmaker in Leon Underwood : Figure and
Rhythm. 2015. p 65
Simon Martin. Introduction in Leon Underwood : Figure and Rhythm. 2015. Chichester: Pallant House
Gallery p 15
Simon Martin. Making an Impression: Underwood the Printmaker in Leon Underwood : Figure and
Rhythm. 2015. p 68
Neve 1974. p 104
Simon Martin. Making an Impression: Underwood the Printmaker in Leon Underwood : Figure and
Rhythm. 2015. p 67
Simon Martin. Making an Impression: Underwood the Printmaker in Leon Underwood : Figure and
Rhythm. 2015. p 70
Simon Martin. Introduction in Leon Underwood : Figure and Rhythm. 2015. Chichester: Pallant
House Gallery p 24
Leon Underwood Sculptural Convictions. First published in the Island, vol.1, no.2, 1931, pp 40–44
Celina Jeffery, ‘Leon Underwood: Collection of African Art’, Journal of Museum Ethnography, no.12
(May 2000), p.27
Ben Whitworth. Sculptural Dimensions In the Early Work Of Leon Underwood in Leon Underwood :
Figure and Rhythm. 2015. Chichester: Pallant House Gallery p 85
18
Leon Underwood : Key Dates
1890
1906–7
1907–10 1910 1913–14 1914–16
1916–18 Born George Claude Leon Underwood, on Christmas Day
Worked in father’s Antiquarian shop in Praed Street, London, copying and
repairing prints.
Studied at Regent Street Polytechnic, under Percival Gaskell.
Won a scholarship to the painting department of the Royal College of Art.
Saw Manet and the Post-Impressionists at the Grafton Galleries.
With his friend Edward Armitage made two trips to Vilna, Poland (Lithuania) where
they were frequent guests at the Ravanica estate (Belarus). Travelled back on
outbreak of First World War through Finland and Sweden.
Enlisted with the Royal Horse Artillery. Served with the 2nd London Field Battery,
Woolwich and at Gommecourt France.
Transferred to the Royal Engineers (Camouflage Section) at Wimereux. War
drawings in Illustrated London News.
1917 Married Mary Coleman.
1918
Invalided back from France, recuperation at Ilfracombe. Submitted trial drawings
to the Ministry of Education’s Propaganda Section for a painting based on
camouflage work.
1919 Painted Erecting a Camouflage Tree for Imperial War Museum.
Bought lease on house and studio at 12 Girdlers Road, Brook Green, in May.
1919–20 Attended Slade School of Art for one-year refresher course in Henry Tonks’ life class.
1920 Awarded Premium in the Prix de Rome art competition. Embarked on sculpture for
the first time with experimental stone carvings.
1920–23 Assistant teacher of life drawing at the Royal College of Art.
1921
Opened the Brook Green School of Drawing at Girdlers Road in January. Installed
etching press and began series of portrait etchings. Began work on Venus in
Kensington Gardens.
1922 1923 -24
1925
First exhibition at Chenil Gallery, Chelsea included Self-Portrait with Landscape.
Spent the summer in Ashurst, Kent where he produced etchings and paintings of
rural scenes.
Resigned teaching post at RCA. Travelled to Paris and Iceland on Prix de Rome
award. Began evening class at Brook Green School.
Visited the Altamira Caves in Spain. Forms the breakaway ‘Wood Engraving
Society’ with some of his students. In December travelled to the USA.
19
Leon Underwood : Key Dates
1926
New York. Opened private drawing school in Greenwich Village. Worked as illustrator
for publishers including Brentano’s, and Vanity Fair. Wrote and illustrated Animalia.
1927
Returned to England and went to Cornwall to write his novel The Siamese Cat with
woodcut illustrations.
1928 Accompanied Phillips Russell on a trip through Mexico. Sketched material to illustrate
the resulting book Red Tiger. Studied Mayan and Aztec architectural sites and art.
Exhibited Mexican wood-engravings and linocuts on return.
1931 Co-founded the art and literature journal The Island. Contributed texts and prints.
1932 Organised and wrote catalogue for Sydney Burney Gallery exhibition Sculpture
Considered Apart from Time and Place featuring modern European sculpture alongside
non-Western and historic sculpture.
1934-37
Published pamphlet Art for Heaven’s Sake. Exhibited drawings, paintings, engravings
and sculpture at Leicester Galleries, Beaux Arts Gallery and with the National Society.
Completed his sculptures June of Youth and Negro Rhythm. In Johannesburg Black
Madonna caused an uproar. Completed chased bronze sculpture of King George VI.
1939-44
1945-49
1953 Served in the Civil Defence Camouflage Establishment, Leamington Spa, and painted a
series of landscape watercolours.
Began paintings on African themes and writing on African art. Published Figures in
Wood of West Africa, Masks of West Africa, Bronzes of West Africa.
Showed African-themed sculptures, paintings and drawings for the Beaux Arts Gallery,
with a catalogue essay expounding his theory of the Cycle of Styles.
1954-57
Received commissions for a mural in tempera (Shell Offices, St Swithins, stained glass
and reredos (Church of St Michael and All Angels, Oxon) and a relief panel (Commercial
Development Building, Old Street)
1958 -59 Published Bronze Age Technology in Western Asia and Northern Europe. Visited
Sculpture Biennale in Antwerp. Stopped painting entirely to concentrate on sculpture.
1960 Commissioned by London County Council in March to make bronze The Pursuit of
Ideas for Hillgrove Estate, London.
1961
Elected Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors. Made bronze crucifix
and candlesticks for Ampleforth Abbey.
1962 Major one-man exhibition at Acquavella Galleries, New York
1966 Awarded the Jean Masson Davidson Medal by the Society of Portrait Sculptors.
1969 Retrospective exhibition at the Minories, Colchester.
1975
Dies in Clapham, London.
20
References and Connections
Introduction
He (Underwood) set out to teach the science
of drawing, of expressing solid form on a flat
surface and not the photographic copying of
tone values, nor the art school limitations of
style in drawing’.
Iceland Using his Prix de Rome Prize money
Underwood travelled to Iceland (instead of Paris)
in 1923 with two of his students. He mastered
some Icelandic, recorded landscapes and figures,
and set down his impressions of his engagement
with daily life. The experience set Underwood
to thinking about the way in which a culture
develops channels of communication.1
West Africa In 1944 Underwood travelled to
West Africa under the auspices of the British
Council. He visited British and French colonies,
including the Gold Coast, Sierra Leone, the
Ivory Coast, Benin and Nigeria, to lecture on the
influence of African Art in Europe, to study local
artistic traditions, contemporary production and
art education. He returned with a substantial
collection of carvings and pottery. From this
point the focus of his figurative painting and
sculpture found its subject in African themes.
Primitive So-called ‘primitive societies’
were those generally identified with nonwestern, ‘uncivilised cultures’. Today these
are questionable terms but ones that gained
dominance in the late nineteenth century,
during the height of colonialism and associated
epistemological debates concerning the nature
of human society. ‘Primitivism’ – a western
art movement that borrows visual forms from
non-Western or prehistoric peoples - became
a central tenet of many Modernist artists. A
central belief expressed in the ‘Island’ was that
‘primitive art’ provided a source of wisdom and
sublimity which could reinvigorate Modern art.2
For Underwood the art of ‘so-called’ primitive
societies also offered inspiration.
Eileen Agar, 1899–1991 Agar was one of
Underwood’s first pupils and a model for one of
the figures in Venus in Kensington Gardens.
She helped to finance Underwood’s trip to the
USA and the publication of the Island. Her own
work was featured in the International Surrealist
Exhibition, London, in 1936. From then on,
she experimented with automatic techniques
and new materials incorporating photographs,
collages and objects.
Altamira In 1879 prehistoric paintings and
drawings were discovered in the caves of
Altamira in Spain. They represented the apogee
of Paleolithic cave art that had developed across
Europe, from the Urals to the Iberian Peninsula
from 35,000 to 11,000 BC. The sophistication
of these paintings challenged presumptions held
by ‘civilised’ societies that prehistoric man did
not have the intellectual capacity to produce any
kind of artistic expression.
Blair Hughes-Stanton, 1902 - 1981 Studied
with Underwood from the age of 19 and over
time they became kindred spirits. HughesStanton accompanied him to Iceland and in
1925, was left in charge of the Brook Green
School when Underwood went to America.
Hughes-Stanton was a major figure in the English
wood engraving revival in the twentieth century
and a member of Underwood’s breakaway group
who formed the English Wood Engraving Society.
The Island, 1931 A quarterly magazine that
ran to four issues in 1931. It was financed by
Eileen Agar and edited by her husband Josef
Bard. It provided a forum for Brook Green
printmaking, poetry and verse and featured
articles, poems and images by artists associated
with the ‘Underwood School’. In his editorial to
the first edition Josef Bard explains Underwood’s
credo as: “the need to realise the Self and
to find its simplest expression. The essence
of dancing with its spontaneity and unity of
feeling and form, suggests the spirit of art in
juxtaposition to aesthetic formulae borrowed
from architecture.”3
Henry Moore, 1898 – 1986 Avant-garde
English sculptor and artist. Moore was one of
Underwood’s core group of students and his
most celebrated. He was to praise Underwood’s
‘passionate attitude towards drawing from life.
21
References and Connections
Art for Heaven’s Sake, 1934 The pamphlet in
which Underwood expounded his ‘Notes on the
Philosophy of Art to-day’, comprising thoughts
and ideas that he accrued whilst working in the
studio with his students. Always busy with the
next idea, Underwood wrote in ‘Art for Heaven’s
Sake’ that ‘the artist is the sower who casts
about him original thought, woven out of his
intuition and imagination; when the conditions
are right, germination takes place. The artist
is the sower who at harvest time is over the
horizon – on his way to sow new ground. 4
taught at the Slade. Regarded by some as the
“most renowned and formidable teacher of his
generation”. Underwood’s independent spirit
and preference for experimentation were not
readily sanctioned by Tonks.
Luncheon of the Boating Party (Le déjeuner
des canotiers), 1881 In contrast to Manet’s
Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe , Renoir’s Le déjeuner
des canotiers received favourable reviews at
the Seventh Impressionist Exhibition in 1882,
for being “ fresh and free without being too
bawdy”. The painting, depicts a group relaxing
on a balcony at the Maison Fournaise along the
Seine in Chatou, France. It combines figures, stilllife, and landscape in one work. As he often did,
Renoir included several of his friends in Luncheon
of the Boating Party, a penchant that Underwood
would echo in his Venus in Kensington Gardens.
Trilogy of books on West African Art
Underwood returned from his travels to West
Africa in 1944 with an enormous collection of
African art. He published widely on the subject
including three seminal books : Figures in Wood of
West Africa 1947, Masks of West Africa 1948
and Bronzes of West Africa 1949. These essays,
together with a number of articles, set out his
interpretation of various aspects of African art.
Le déjeuner sur l´herbe, 1862 - 1863
Edouard Manet’s painting Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe
(1862-1863) is a large impressionist painting
that broke away from established conventions
and modes of representation. The painting depicts
a female nude at a picnic with two fully dressed
men. Behind them a scantily dressed woman is
bathing in a stream. The painting was rejected
by the Salon jury of 1863 on grounds of the
incongruity of a nude (a classical subject) in a
modern setting. Manet therefore exhibited the
canvas in the Salon de Refusés where its notoriety
caused much controversy. The connection to
Underwood can be seen in a mutual desire to
break free of restrictive artistic convention and
experiment with subject and form.
1: Drawing and Painting
Camouflage The British Army commandeered
artists’ skills for their camouflage units. Captain
Underwood joined the camouflage unit in 1916
and served in France at Wymereux. Camouflage
trees were used in trench warfare to replace
real trees with dummies to change landscape
features and confuse enemy reference points.
The substitute tree could also serve as an
observation post. In 1919 Underwood was
commissioned by the Propaganda section of the
Ministry of Information to create a painting on
the subject of camouflage.
Venus of Willendorf c 25000 b.c
Gravettian period. A figurine in painted
limestone discovered on the archeological
sites of Willendorf, Lower Austria. The specific
function of the Venus is unknown, although
suggestions include its role as mother goddess
or a symbolic icon of fertility. The breasts and
thighs are extremely exaggerated. The figure
has no visible face, her head being covered with
circular horizontal bands of what might be rows
of plaited hair or a type of headdress. She is
possibly looking down in submission.
Brook Green School Underwood set up his
own school in 1921, in a former architects
studio in Hammersmith. It took its name from
Brook Green at the western end of Girders Road.
Life drawing was the main focus of instruction.
His students were treated as artists in the hope
that ‘the harmful and repressive influences of
orthodox art training’ could be avoided.
Henry Tonks, 1862 – 1937 Trained as a
surgeon and taught anatomy. Studied art at
Westminster School of Art and from 1892
22
References and Connections
Chaac Mool The chacmool is a ceremonial
sacrificial altar of the Toltec, who predated the
Aztecs, also associated with the Maya. The
chacmool is a distinctive form of Mesoamerican
sculpture representing a reclining figure with its
head facing 90 degrees from the front, leaning
on its elbows and supporting a bowl or a disk
upon its chest. Underwood saw a recently
discovered example at the famous temple of
Chichén Itzá, a Mayan site built around 600 CE.
3: Wood Engraving
Le Bestiaire ou Cortège d’Orphée An album
of 30 short poems by Guillaume Apollinaire with
woodcuts by Raoul Dufy, published in 1911
4: Linocut
Diego Rivera, 1886 – 1957 A prominent
Mexican painter and the husband of Frida Kahlo.
Known for his painted murals in Mexico and
North American Cities. In the 1920s the themes
of his murals dealt with Mexican society and
reflected the country’s 1910 revolution. He
participated in the founding of the Revolutionary
Union of Technical Workers, Painters and
Sculptors, and joined the Mexican Communist
Party. Rivera developed his own native style
based on large, simplified figures and bold
colours with an Aztec influence.
Endnotes
1Christopher Neve, Leon Underwood London:
Thames & Hudson, 1974
2 Celina Jeffery, ‘Leon Underwood: Collection of
African Art’, Journal of Museum Ethnography,
no.12 (May 2000), footnote
3 Josef Bard. Editorial. The Island : a quarterly.
Vol 1, Nº 1 1931 p 2
4 Leon Underwood, Art for Heaven’s Sake.
London: Faber and Faber, 1934
5 Leon Underwood, ‘Provisional draft for a
report on art in West Africa, 2/11/45’, 1945,
Henry Moore Institute Archive, Box 2. Cited
in Charlotte Stokes, Artist as Anthropologist in
Leon Underwood : Figure and Rhythm. 2015.
Chichester: Pallant House Gallery p 112
José Clemente Orozco, 1883 - 1949 A
Mexican painter, who specialized in bold murals
that established the Mexican Mural Renaissance
together with Diego Rivera, David Alfaro
Siqueiros, and others. Orozco was the most
complex of the Mexican Muralists, fond of the
theme of human suffering, but less realistic and
more fascinated by machines than Rivera.
5: Sculpture
British Council In 1944 Underwood succeeded
in gaining the support of the British Council for
a trip to regions of West Africa. The remit of the
British Council (formed 1940) was to promote
‘a wider knowledge of the United Kingdom and
the English language abroad and develop ‘closer
cultural relations between [the UK] and other
countries’. Although Underwood did not engage
directly with the growing debate concerning
decolonisation, he was concerned that Africans
should understand the significance and impact
of their own tribal art on Western culture. He
believed the preservation of indigenous art
would be profitable to both Africa and Europe.
However, he also stated African art was at the
point of exhaustion, fearing that: ‘Africa can
produce no more art comparable with that of
her past genius, without some restoration of her
artistic fertility’.5
23
Written by Lesley Crewdson
Designed by Louise Bristow
Natalie Franklin, Learning Programme Manager
[email protected], 01243 770839
Telephone 01243 774557
[email protected]
www.pallant.org.uk
9 North Pallant, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 1TJ