Three and One No. 1

Painted in 1973, Three and One No. 1 illustrates the new sense of purity and focus that marked William Scott’s painterly work during the late 1960s and early 1970s. He embarked upon a series of pared-back, semi-abstract compositions that extended his devotion to the still-life genre. In the present work, which was painted during the culmination of this seminal series of paintings, Scott’s enchantment with simplicity is at its apex. While featuring many of the same objects and utensils that had dominated the artist’s oeuvre, the familiar forms of pots and saucepans, bowls and cups are now distilled down to bare simple outlines and neat silhouettes, which appear to float weightlessly against the void, held in place by an imperceptible internal tension. Rendered in an austere, highly-refined palette, Three and One No. 1 is practically devoid of chromatic associations, instead, our focus is on the arrangement of form, line and space – seen here in unequivocal harmony.

Referring to the paintings of the early 1970s, Professor Norbert Lynton, the art historian and prominent champion of Scott’s work, commented: 'Some paintings in the series have horizons as well as a band at the bottom, but most of the series do not have either. When there is no internal division, the scale and proportions of the whole surface are asserted unambiguously, while internal tensions, set up by the objects in it, become more marked. Their number, size and placing is of dominant importance, notably their closeness or distance from each other and their touching or not touching the edges. Whether or not the handle of the frying pan, featured in all these paintings as a vertical accent, touches (and is thereby sensed as going beyond) the top edge is a matter of major dramatic concern. When the handle goes to the top, it appears to establish a specific place within the envelope of space, sensed as being just in front of the ground. The colour, or lack of colour, of the forms affects their location on or off this plane; forms sharing a colour will tend to share one plane, while others relate variously to it. But there is also a sense in which colour equals strength in these economical compositions, and thus determines the visual weight and character of every item. A solid black form is likely to make a strong mark and attract our eyes, but not necessarily more so than a white form on a pale ground, hovering mysteriously' (N. Lynton, William Scott, London, 2004, pp. 317-318).

William Scott was the first major British artist to be introduced to the principal figures of American Abstract Expressionism, through his New York based dealer, Martha Jackson. In 1953, after spending the previous summer teaching at Banff School of Fine Art in Alberta, Scott visited New York where he met American artists including Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning and Franz Kline. He recalled that his first impressions of this new form of art was that of ‘bewilderment, it was not the originality of the work, but it was the scale, audacity and self-confidence – something had happened to painting’ (W. Scott quoted in ibid, p. 109). During this critical period in which British artists were not only exploring the post-war cultural landscape in Europe but reacting to the wave of Abstract Expressionism from New York, Scott was at the forefront of this vanguard, travelling extensively in both Europe and North America throughout his lifetime.

We are very grateful to The William Scott Foundation for their assistance in preparing this catalogue entry.