Saturday 6 August 2011

Charles Paine: Edinburgh connections


The British designer Charles Paine (1895 - 1967) is my lead-in to the next post on the work of staff and students at Blackheath art school in the 1930s. Alot like F Gregory Brown, Paine began work as the arts and crafts movement was coming to an end. Apprenticed as a stained glass designer in his home town of Salford, Lancashire, he went on to train in Manchester, followed by the RCA in London. As studies were interrupted by service in the armed forces, he didn't finally graduate untill 1919. I wonder if he was astute enough by then to recognise the opportunities that work in Edinburgh was to offer him. I suspect that he was.


Edinburgh College of Art  already had two of the best British printmakers at work. Not only was its director Frank Morley Fletcher but Mabel Royds also returned to work there about the same time Paine took up his post in the department of applied arts. This field of work was dear to Morley Fletcher's heart and it was not long before he appointed yet another important printmaker to be Charles Paine's immediate boss. This was John Platt. Paine could not have known just how useful this was all to prove. He left Edinburgh fairly soon afterwards (I'm not sure exactly when) to work in stained glass for the Glasgow firm of Guthrie and Wells. But Edinburgh hadn't left him. As early as 1921, he received his first breakthrough commission to design posters for London Underground.


It's impossible to say whether it was Platt who put him onto Frank Pick at the Underground. Platt was noted for his genorosity towards people and my hunch is that it was Platt who made the introduction. As it happens, 1922 also saw Platt designing his one-and-only poster for the Tube -  his chamaeleon design, too clever and too complicated. Unlike Platt and Gregory Brown, Paine wasn't a painter and was rarely tempted into picture-making when he designed. Paine's training in stained glass led him to concentrate on strong colours and simplified images. In his most effective work, he did exactly that.


But he also made a move that we would now take for granted in advertising but which must have been alot less obvious at the time.  Instead of relating his imagery to the subject in a literal way, he often chose an image for what it suggested. What have fish in a river to do with Uxbridge? Very little other than suggest the countryside that lies just beyond the end of the line. Even bolder was his poster for the 1921 boat race - nothing more than a stylised wake and the ripples left by the oars. He understands that he only has to attract attention, that he doesn't have to represent anything to get a message across.


And looking at this end-paper above and his advertising for Sundour fabrics, no one could accuse Paine and sticking to a formula. One of the remarkable things about him is his ability to match his manner to the job. Whether this meant falling back on historical pastiche or picking up the latest design trend, didn't matter. (Nor do I want to suggest he was only involved in graphics from the twenties onwards but I've been unable to turn up a single textile or stained glass design by him).


I don't know when Paine made his move to California, but in 1924 Morley Fletcher was appointed first director of the new Santa Barbara School of Arts. I am pretty sure it must have been his old boss at Edinburgh who motivated him but I don't know whether his job as head of applied arts at the Community Arts School was under Morley Fletcher's supervision. But he didn't stay, anyway. It's clear that artists like Fletcher recognised his ability but it strikes me that teaching wasn't something he felt committed to - unlike Fletcher and Platt.


But one thing that does remain constant during the period was his use of animal imagery, specially where no animals are really called for. Their appeal to children is strong, their appeal to adults through children even stronger. Around 1930 he was living in Welwyn Garden City, a new garden suburb in rural Hertfordshire, where he was commissioned by the development company to design posters for use on London underground. The choice of the four seasons as their subject emphasised its all-year-round appeal. Not that Paine went for the obvious option. No charming houses and lovely countryside for him. Instead he produced four remarkably modern animal images: a lamb and snowdrops for spring (which frankly was pushing it) insects round what looks like a daffodill for summer, hares in the snow and a chaffinch for winter, and this tremendous red squirrel for the autumn. Yes, they are standard ideas but the execution implies an educated audience. The appeal is both muted, up-to-date and subtle. (Unfortunately, some misguided individual at Welwyn Hatfield borough council has chosen to bung SAMPLE across the other three images - the only ones available to a world-wide audience. I only hope the culprit reads this.) And what else was Paine doing while designing posters for the Welwyn estate? Well, he was back to teaching, this time at Blackheath school of art in London. And who was he working for now? It was John Platt, of course.

18 comments:

  1. i LOVE that duck in #1!, and all of his transportation posters at the top.

    the one with the deer and the squirrel is new to me, so thank you!

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  2. I think he invented the duck the way Jungnickel invented parrots.

    Finding new stuff gets harder all the time.

    Charles

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  3. but just remember-- to new eyes the old is new again.

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  4. Exactly, Lily. It's the only thing that keeps our two blogs going.

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  5. but don't you think it's also this urgency to know more, to learn more, to have one's own eyes renewed as a new level emerges.

    i mean, i'm just beginning to get an inkling of how this whole transition, for many artists, was less about changing visual styles than it was about the artist transforming himself from within, so the world really did *appear* differently to him.

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  6. Paine was a polymath. He most enjoyed painting with water colour particularly after his move to Jersey in 1948. He painted in Ireland and in France.

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  7. I would like to add that Paine was an inspirational teacher. How much he actually enjoyed it no-one can say but art students flocked to his classes in Santa Barbara and among them was Teuila, then Isobel Field, the step-daughter of Robert Louis Stevenson. She thought him the greatest artist ever to go to California.

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  8. Perhaps one problem with Paine is that he was a polymath and what I was able to find was very diverse and not easy to sum up. He certainly deserves more original research that I was able to do. I have come across only one colour woodcut by him, but there are possibly others. As you suggest, it sounds like a varied and interesting life and there is obviously more information out there.

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    1. I have done some research into Paine's life and work and can confirm that you are quite right in supposing that he made very advantageous and long lasting contacts at Edinburgh. I note that you have been unable to find any example of his stained glass. He designed a memorial window for Sir Peter Mackie that can be seen on the website of the St. Ninian's Scottish Episcopal Church, Troon. Paine was acquainted with Douglas Strachan who greatly admired his work and encouraged him to submit a window for the Glasgow Exhibition in 1938. I don't know if he had one accepted but he did design a Cable Ship Display that was described in 'British Textile Designers Today' as 'vigorous'. I don't know of any colour woodcuts by him but John Platt gave him a print of The Lamb inscribed 'to CP from JP 934'.



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  9. Hi,
    I have recently aquired a collection of school educational posters and included are six by Charles Paine. However they are dated Jan- July 1968, and where printed as part of the Child Eduction Supplement. They depict people at work, the fireman, policeman, dustman, doctor etc. Is this the kind of work he was doing near the end of his life, or is this another Charles Paine?
    Mark

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    1. Paine died in 1967. At the time of his death he was working on a large painting of the Ecrehous, a group of islands off the coast of Jersey. After moving to Jersey in 1948 he continued to work on commissions but the only ones I know of were in stained glass. He produced some 90 images for the series 'English Today' by Ronald Ridout pub. 1947. Possibly some of these may have been reproduced on your posters though I think it unlikely. Would it be possible for you to post an example here?

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    2. All you have to do is send me some images by email and I will happily post them. I wouldn't have thought Paine was only working on stained glass. It would also help if people put a name at the bottom of their comment because I think there are possibly two people commenting as 'Anonymous'. I am getting confused anyway.

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  10. Sorry this reply is so late. The answer is I don't know. In fact, I don't know that much about Paine. But he did make all kinds of posters so it is probably the same person. Artists don't retire, anyway!

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  11. i recently bought a painting, signed C. Paine 1957. One side is an abstract of trees the other a restaurant scene in expressionistic style of Edward Hopper. Quite a large painting bought in southern California. Wonder if this is the same Charles Paine since he wasn't know to paint? Appreciate any comments.

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  12. Hi,

    I have to admit I am no expert on Paine but he did teach in Santa Barbara in the mid 1920s. Are you sure the date is 1957? But he was alive then. He was born in 1895 and died in 1967. Apparently after returning to Britain he eventually went to live in the Channel Islands (Jersey).

    It is quite possible that he did paint. Have you tried doing a Google image search to see what turns up? Anyway, it's always interesting to hear about him.

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    1. I would like to make some further comments on Paine. Is it possible for me to post images on this blog?

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    2. I'm afraid you can only send images to by email for me to post but I can always add your comments as a reader's contribution. I would just create a new post. If you're interested, the contact is: cgc@waitrose.com

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  13. Darnley Fine Art are holding a selling exhibition of Charles Paine original works starting on the 5th December 2015. Lots of archives and letters about him included in the exhibition.

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