Ceri Richards (1903-1971)

In December 1938, Ceri Richards purchased Max Ernst's painting The Bride of the Wind (1926) from the London Gallery. The painting had belonged to Paul Eluard and subsequently Roland Penrose. The work allowed Richards to tap into the spirit of 1920s Surrealism and realise 'how rich in content is our subconscious or submerged self and how fertile the free play of thought can be.' Richards was in the Home Guard throughout the war, managing to work sporadically. The destructive energy of the war and the menace of the Blitz precipitated an interest in metamorphosis, constant flux and elemental chaos. The present work is closely related to The Sculptor's Landscape (Homage to Henry Moore) from 1943 in the Glynn Vivian Museum and Art Gallery, Swansea and to Welsh Landscape, 1945, illustrated in Mel Gooding, Ceri Richards, Cameron & Hollis: 2002, (p. 66).