Dimensions: support: 507 x 400 mm frame: 643 x 548 x 98 mm
Copyright: © The estate of William Scott | CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 DEED, Photo: Tate
Curator: Here we have William Scott’s "Seated Nude." Scott, who lived from 1913 to 1989, painted this piece. Editor: It feels so…contained. The figure is almost swallowed by the chair, and that stark white cloth contrasts dramatically with the muted background. Curator: Scott’s nudes often challenge traditional representations of the female form. The almost childlike simplicity can be read as a rejection of idealized beauty standards prevalent at the time. Editor: There's a strange vulnerability here, yet also a strength in that direct gaze. It’s as if she's daring us to look, challenging our expectations of what a nude should be. Curator: Exactly. Scott consistently explored the tension between abstraction and figuration. Editor: It lingers, doesn't it? I find myself wanting to know her story.
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This was one of a series of seated figures Scott painted in Brittany in 1938-9.The model for it was the artist's wife. Scott painted her at Pont-Aven in the summer of 1939. The painting has a directness and simplicity that conveys a feeling of innocence. At the time all Scott's paintings were done from life and show his interest in such artists as Derain, Modigliani and Cézanne. He related the directness of his paint handling here to the work of Matisse and the figure seems to relate to Matisse's primitivistic portrayals of nudes in landscape of about 1907-8. Gallery label, September 2004
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