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Lot Essay
Sutherland travelled to the South of France for the first time in 1947, with his close friend Francis Bacon. His visits to France gave him the opportunity to paint a very different landscape to that of wartime London which he had painted during his time as an Official War Artist from 1940-45. He socialised with glamourous figures, such as Somerset Maugham and Pablo Picasso, and this exciting environment encouraged him to return repeatedly. In 1952 he purchased La Villa Blanche in Menton with the intention to spend his summers there.
Sutherland encountered a new and brighter aesthetic at Menton, as well as further natural material which would be fundamental to the rejuvenation of his practice. As a result, new motifs emerged in his summer sketch books, notably the addition of a series of sketches of Datura flowers which grew outside the tall windows of La Villa Blanche. Later in 1956, Sutherland would work this theme into the present painting. This is a unique addition to Sutherland’s work from France: he has sketched the distinctive contorted forms of the flowers in a dry white oil, and added a hazy green foliage framed by geometric lines alluding to the window pane. This use of a compositional framework, as well as the use of dry oils, can be seen to filter into Bacon’s work at this time, as the two artists painted alongside one another in France. The dark background adds a dramatic and menacing component to the still life, perhaps reacting to the fact that Datura flowers, sometimes referred to as 'Devil's Snare', have powerful hallucinogenic qualities, becoming fatally toxic in higher doses.
Sutherland encountered a new and brighter aesthetic at Menton, as well as further natural material which would be fundamental to the rejuvenation of his practice. As a result, new motifs emerged in his summer sketch books, notably the addition of a series of sketches of Datura flowers which grew outside the tall windows of La Villa Blanche. Later in 1956, Sutherland would work this theme into the present painting. This is a unique addition to Sutherland’s work from France: he has sketched the distinctive contorted forms of the flowers in a dry white oil, and added a hazy green foliage framed by geometric lines alluding to the window pane. This use of a compositional framework, as well as the use of dry oils, can be seen to filter into Bacon’s work at this time, as the two artists painted alongside one another in France. The dark background adds a dramatic and menacing component to the still life, perhaps reacting to the fact that Datura flowers, sometimes referred to as 'Devil's Snare', have powerful hallucinogenic qualities, becoming fatally toxic in higher doses.