Tudor 'Thames' Iron Knife Group

Signed in the bottom right corner of the watercolour; framed and glazed with loops for suspension to the reverse. 1.65 kgs, 40.4 cm



Ex Albert Ward collection, Essex, UK.

J.W.S. Cox (1911-1982) was an American watercolourist renowned for developing the wet-on-wet painting technique. He grew up in New York, where he avidly sketched landscapes from an early age. The artist graduated from Pratt Institute NYC in 1933 and worked various jobs through the Great Depression. In 1936, he studied at the Acadamie Colarossie in Paris, and with Fauvist Othon Friesz for a short time, although later dismissed the Fauvist style as 'sloppy'. He went on to teach watercolour painting to students at Boston University, founding a studio on Bearskin Neck, Rockport, where he developed his 'sponge painting' and palette-knife techniques. He painted with an individualistic style, becoming a member of the Boston Watercolour Society. Cox shunned publicity as he believed it robbed him of painting time and turned down membership to the National Academy because he 'wouldn't play the game'. A Renaissance man, Cox spoke 12 languages with a goal to present himself 'and the soul of nature as truthfully and with as much inspiration, vitality and freshness as is possible, through the medium of watercolour'. He died of a heart attack in Florida in 1982.

Modelled in the round, Mary wearing elegantly draped tiered garments and supporting the infant Jesus on her bent left arm, holding a lily in her right hand; Jesus carved in active pose wearing an ankle-length robe, holding a fold of Mary's wimple and clutching an orb; rectangular rustic base. 2 kg, 50 cm high



Acquired in the late 2000s. Private Cambridgeshire, UK, collection.

Including decorative examples; thimbles with open tops; stamped silver examples and a possible child's thimble. 73 grams total, 18-28 mm



Found Thames foreshore spoil, 1980s.