John Nash (1893-1977) captured the English countryside in the wake of the First and Second World Wars in a lyrical, evocative style that was a deeply felt response to the land he loved, and the solace nature can offer after the horrors of war.
John and his older brother and fellow artist Paul grew up in the Buckinghamshire countryside, where John developed an abiding interest in botany. Whilst Paul went on to study at the Slade School of Art, John received no formal artistic training. Through natural talent, observation, practise and the encouragement and support of his brother, John found success as an artist when the brothers held their first joint exhibition at the Dorien Leigh Gallery in London in 1913. He became a founder member of the London Group, one of the oldest artist-led groups, the following year.
Life was abruptly halted by the outbreak of the First World War, and John and Paul enlisted in the Artists Rifles, a regiment founded in 1860 by a group of painters, architects, poets and sculptors and the natural choice for young men of an artistic persuasion in 1914, many of whom went on to serve as officers in other regiments. John, alongside his brother, became an official war artist in 1918 – and the pair shared a studio. Here they would work on official pieces during the day but spent their evenings painting for themselves. John’s most famous war painting, ‘Over the Top’, depicts in a stark and haunting manner the attack at Welsh Ridge near Cambrai in which 68 of the 80 soldiers of the Artists Rifles were killed – John was one of only twelve survivors.
After the war, John married fellow artist Christine Kühlenthal and the pair settled in Gerrards Cross, making summer expeditions to the Chilterns and Gloucestershire to paint. John began a career in teaching art, first at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art in Oxford, and later at the Royal College of Art. John’s work from this period captured the English countryside – his paintings idyllic on the surface but tinged with a brooding, claustrophobic atmosphere that was left over from his experiences during the war. Whilst never subscribing to any of the major movements in British art, and being overshadowed by his more famous brother, he became an integral part of the cultural landscape.
Expanding his body of work, John began making wood engravings and lithographs and returning to his love of botany he produced beautiful illustrations of plants for various publications. As Europe once again fell under the shadow of war, John served in the Observer Corps and later as an official war artist with the Admiralty. On returning to civilian life, he and Christine settled in Bottengoms Farm in the Stour Valley on the Suffolk Essex border. Here he was surrounded by an artistic community and created a body of work depicting the landscape in this deeply rural corner of the country, often painting in the evening, a practise left over from wartime that suffused his work with intense, rich light.
Coming up for auction this October is “Boxted Mill Pool”, painted close to Bottengoms Farm (estimate: £30,000-50,000 plus buyer's premium). A quiet and peaceful scene, devoid of human activity, it is painted with an almost dream-like quality with the elements of the sky, foliage and water picked out in feathery brushstrokes that soften the composition. This is rural England in a disappearing world, a quiet oasis chasing away the shadows of war.
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