Etching and drypoint on paper
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<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/fred-williams-2307" aria-label="More by Fred Williams" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Fred Williams</a>
Coal Delivery
Presented by the artist's estate 2013
<p><span>Coal Delivery</span> 1953 is an etching and drypoint print on paper that exists in three states, with this example representing the first state. The third and final state is smaller (see Tate add acc no), the etching plate having been cut down at the top and at the left-hand side. The second state is an intermediate state before which Williams cut down the zinc plate on which he worked and has one length of burr that is removed from the final plate. The print shows two coal delivery men, each with a sack of coal on his shoulders. The foreground figure is shown in profile while behind him is a sketchily drawn figure who appears to face forward. The composition of the figures echoes that in Williams’s painting <span>Coal Delivery </span>1955 (Tate T12268) as well as their relative positioning on the canvas. The print offers architectural detail that the painting omits. However, although these marks situate the figures in space, they cannot be identified exactly (beyond the suggestion of a coal chute and, at the rear, steps leading up to a coal trailer). The third state reflects the composition of the painting more closely in that the foreground figure is positioned centrally, losing much of the detail of the trailer and coal chute as a result.</p>
paper print etching drypoint
Coal Delivery
image: 202 × 112 mm
Presented by the artist's estate 2013
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<p>
<i>Coal Delivery</i> 1953 is an etching and drypoint print on paper that exists in three states, with this example representing the first state. The third and final state is smaller (see Tate add acc no), the etching plate having been cut down at the top and at the left-hand side. The second state is an intermediate state before which Williams cut down the zinc plate on which he worked and has one length of burr that is removed from the final plate. The print shows two coal delivery men, each with a sack of coal on his shoulders. The foreground figure is shown in profile while behind him is a sketchily drawn figure who appears to face forward. The composition of the figures echoes that in Williams’s painting <i>Coal Delivery </i>1955 (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/williams-coal-delivery-t12268" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>T12268</span></a>) as well as their relative positioning on the canvas. The print offers architectural detail that the painting omits. However, although these marks situate the figures in space, they cannot be identified exactly (beyond the suggestion of a coal chute and, at the rear, steps leading up to a coal trailer). The third state reflects the composition of the painting more closely in that the foreground figure is positioned centrally, losing much of the detail of the trailer and coal chute as a result.</p>
<p>Williams arrived in London from Australia in 1951 and did not return until 1956. This was a time when Britain was increasingly receptive to French and, latterly, American art and these years offered Williams a chance to absorb contemporary European art. It was while he was living in London that he first turned to printmaking, when he studied briefly at the Central School of Arts and Crafts. The studio printer who assisted him had also worked as a printer for Walter Richard Sickert (1860–1942) (at the same time Williams worked in Robert Savage’s framing shop alongside Roger Hilton and Yves Klein). He was immediately prolific, creating at least 117 prints during this short two-year period, most of which exist in more than one state (one in as many as fourteen states). Dating from his time in London, <i>Coal Delivery</i> is typical of the subjects that Williams sought for his work, found in the music hall, the circus and the street, and reflects his interest in the work of Honoré Daumier (1808–1879), Sickert and the poetry of everyday life. Williams’s London prints often acted as studies for paintings and then evolved and developed to their own ends, although this relationship was not always clear cut. His friend the artist John Brack explained: ‘Mostly these etchings were made from sketches drawn on the spot, and some were also the basis for paintings, though the painting is never a translated version of the print, any more than the etching is a translated drawing’ (John Brack, ‘Introduction’, in Brack and Mollison 1968, p.6).</p>
<p>The genesis of Williams’s work in rapid sketches from life is conveyed in <i>Coal Delivery</i>, and despite the generalised way in which he drew the figures, removing facial characteristics and personality, the Australian art historian Deborah Hart has written that each figure is drawn ‘in a way that invests him with dignity and suggests the artist’s recognition of the value of hard labour’ (National Gallery of Australia 2011, p.40).</p>
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<b>Further reading</b>
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<i>Fred Williams: Etchings</i>, exhibition catalogue, Rudy Komon Gallery, Woollahra 1968, reproduced p.100.<br/>Patrick McCaughey, <i>Fred Williams: 1927–1982</i>, London 2008.<br/>Fred Williams, <i>Infinite Horizons</i>, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra 2011.</p>
<p>Andrew Wilson<br/>July 2013</p>
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Summary
2018-06-19T00:00:00
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