The Camden Town Group in Context

... ; purchased from Mrs Cicely Marchant through the French Gallery, London, by Howard Bliss 1932, from whom purchased by Tate Gallery 1941.

Interior of St Mark’s, Venice is painted on a fine plain-weave linen canvas that was probably pre-primed and stretched by an artists’ colourman. The canvas has been prepared with sizing and an off-white primer that covers the extent of the canvas and is reasonably thin, retaining the finely grained texture of the cloth.

The artist has applied a thin layer of grey paint over the commercial primer to function as an optical ground; it is left exposed in places by the subsequent painting process, and appears to have been brushed on randomly, producing a texture independent of the final image. Initial drawing appears to have been carried out in black paint applied directly on to the grey ground, with no evidence of any underdrawing in graphic media. The artist has applied at least two layers of paint onto the optical ground, working in a limited range of colours, low in tone. The liquid scumbles of paint are thinly applied allowing the grey ground to alter the tone of the overlying layers and in places leaving it completely exposed to function as a neutral mid-tone (a so-called mid-ground technique). Earlier applications were probably allowed to dry before further painting (see also Tate N05914).

Sickert has used the texture of the canvas and the paint surface to vary his application and retain a sense of spontaneity. There are areas of broken brushwork where a stiff brush has bounced across the dry surface and occasional brush hairs are left in the paint where the artist has worked vigorously over partly dried paint. In general he has pre-mixed his colours on the palette, but there are touches that appear unresolved, the bright blue paint in the foreground, for example. The painting has been varnished and, at some point during its history, lined, which has slightly affected the painting’s surface qualities but has not reduced the display of technical skill in this work.1

During his visit to Venice in 1895–6, Walter Sickert wrote to his friend Philip Wilson Steer that ‘on cold days I do interiors in St Mark’s ... St Mark’s is engrossing’.1 His aim, he said, was to emulate Steer’s own technique:

These comments suggest that Sickert made a number of pictures of the interior of St Mark’s, but only one other painting in oils is known, Church Interior with a Figure in a Niche 1895–6 (private collection),3 an oil study of part of the apse. A pencil drawing exists of a third composition, Interior of San Marco, Venice 1895–6 (private collection),4 which shows the basilica filled by its congregation, viewed from a balcony.

The loose painting and free handling of Interior of St Mark’s, Venice suggest that Sickert might well have painted it in situ. Unlike the small studies of the exterior of St Mark’s that he made (see Tate N05914), this is a relatively large canvas that would require an easel to support it. There are no suggestions of composition lines under the paint surface, or squaring up, and so the implication is that Sickert painted the interior from sight, a considerable achievement. Sickert’s position is halfway down the right side of the nave, looking towards the iconostasis and apse, but also allowing a dual perspective on the left up to the mosaics of the Chapel of St Isidore. It is a complicated and ambitious perspective that manages to include much of the interior all at the same time, and gives a sense of the complex vaulting of St Mark’s. The viewpoint is relatively low, suggesting Sickert was seated. Although painted in subdued, restricted colours, Sickert conveys the glitter of mosaics and gilding, and lamps above, with carefully controlled highlights. He was preoccupied with conveying in touches of paint the effects of both natural and artificial light. The art historian Wendy Baron has drawn comparison with the pictures of the Old Bedford music-hall balcony Sickert made before leaving for Venice.5 While Interior of St Mark’s, Venice is more expansive in its composition, the viewpoint looking up, the handling of paint, rich colouring and extravagant architecture all hold strong resonance with the Old Bedford pictures.

Another arresting similarity is to the series of studies J.M.W. Turner made in St Mark’s in the mid-nineteenth century (see, for instance, figs.1 and 2).6 Executed in gouache on brown paper, these works have a strong resemblance to Sickert’s oil, as they too are painted in loose, fluid brushstrokes, and have the same sort of low-key palette accented with highlights. Turner’s works on paper were displayed at the National Gallery in a series of selections made by John Ruskin in the closing decades of the nineteenth century.

Interior of St Mark’s, Venice was acquired in 1937 through one of Sickert’s dealers, The French Gallery, by Howard Bliss (1894–1977). An accomplished musician, he was the younger brother of the composer Arthur Bliss. He was an avid collector who built an important collection of modern British pictures. In particular, he was a passionate advocate and collector of the painter Ivon Hitchens, and arranged a number of exhibitions of his work throughout the country. After 1945 Bliss began to collect the work of unknown younger artists, often students, painting in an advanced style,7 and he purchased pictures by Patrick Heron, Peter Lanyon, William Scott and John Craxton. In 1950 he held an exhibition at the Leicester Galleries, London, so he might sell off works to make space for new ones.8 ‘I would rather be a collector,’ Bliss confessed in the catalogue introduction, ‘than the owner of a collection.’9 He wrote here that the collection ‘was begun seven years ago’, in 1943, but Sickert’s Interior of St Mark’s, Venice was acquired some years before and was therefore perhaps one of the earliest pictures he purchased.