Oil paint on canvas
Tate Britain
Tate Collection
Works with images
Works on display
General Collection
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/dame-ethel-walker-2115" aria-label="More by Dame Ethel Walker" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Dame Ethel Walker</a>
Decoration Excursion Nausicaa
Purchased 1924
actions: postures and motions
actions: processes and functions
adults
animals: mammals
bending forward
carrying / holding
classical myths: gods and heroes
domestic
female
food and drink
fruit - non-specific
goat
group
groups
jug
kneeling
laundering
Nausicaa
nudes
objects
people
religion and belief
vessels and containers
woman
work and occupations
painting oil paint canvas
5 April 2017 – 1 October 2017
2017-10-01
5 April 2017 – 1 October 2017
2017-10-01
2017-04-05
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2017-04-05
Queer British Art
Exhibition
22 October 2020 – 21 March 2021
2021-03-21
22 October 2020 – 21 March 2021
2021-03-21
2020-10-22
IVAM, Institut Valencià d’Art Modern (Valencia, Spain)
2020-10-22
MORAL DIS/ORDER. Sexuality and Visual Culture in Europe between the Wars
Loan-out
9 October 2023 – 12 May 2024
2024-05-12
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2023-10-09
Ethel Walker: Female Utopias
Collection based display
16 May 2024 – 13 October 2024
2024-10-13
16 May 2024 – 13 October 2024
2024-10-13
2024-05-16
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2024-05-16
Now You See Us: Women Artists in Britain 1520-1920
Exhibition
20 September 2025 – 15 February 2026
2026-02-15
20 September 2025 – 15 February 2026
2026-02-15
2025-09-20
K20 Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen (Düsseldorf, Germany)
2025-09-20
Modern Oblivion - Queer Modernity
Loan-out
Decoration: The Excursion of Nausicaa
support: 1835 × 3670 mm

Purchased 1924
<p><b>N03885</b> DECORATION: THE EXCURSION OF NAUSICAA 1920
<br/>
<br/>Inscr. ‘Ethel Walker 1920’ b.l.
<br/>Canvas, 72 1/4×144 1/2 (183·5×379·5).
<br/>Purchased from the artist (Grant-in-Aid) 1924.
<br/><i>Exh:</i> N.E.A.C., summer 1920 (46); R.A., <i>Decorative Art</i>, winter 1923 (122).
<br/><i>Lit:</i> Mary Chamot, <i>Modern Painting in England</i>, 1937, p.63; Frank Rutter, <i>Modern Masterpieces</i>, n.d., p.276; John Rothenstein, <i>Modern English Painters: Sickert to Smith</i>, 1952, p.84, repr. pl.7, facing p.65.</p>
<p>In several exhibitions of the <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/n/new-english-art-club" title="Glossary definition for 'New English Art Club'"><span>New English Art Club</span></a> prior to 1920 the artist exhibited studies ‘for a frieze’ which may have been done in connexion with ‘Nausicaa’. There were also studies of goats shown at the Goupil Gallery <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/s/salon" title="Glossary definition for 'Salon'"><span>Salon</span></a>, 1919 (199) and at the N.E.A.C., January 1920 (139), and winter 1942 (44 and 48).</p>
<p>Writing to J. B. Manson (Monday, 2 June, no year given, but almost certainly 1924), the artist described her work thus:‘... Nausicaa early one lovely summer's morning goes to her father and mother - the King and Queen - to ask permission to have a waggon and mules given to her to take her and her attendants and to fill it with the clothes of the palace that require washing, also with dainties and wine and good food for a forthcoming picnic - and go down to the river adjoining the sea to wash them - which he gives her. On arriving at the river they unharness the mules and are unpacking or unloading the waggons of the clothes and the food for the picnic, and are beginning to wash them in the river. A little wood divides the sea from the river where the goat girl - kneeling by the tree near her goats - hears the strange voices that are sounding in her usually silent little wood. To show it is the sea a girl, nude, has stepped up on to the bank after bathing....’ The story is based on Book VI of the <i>Odyssey:</i> ‘... they spread/The raiment orderly along the beach/Where dashing tides .../... leaving the garments, stretch'd/ In noon-day fervour of the sun, to dry.’</p>
<p>Vernon Wethered commissioned the artist to paint a small replica of ‘Nausicaa’ and he also owned the preliminary <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/w/watercolour" title="Glossary definition for 'Watercolour'"><span>watercolour</span></a> of this version. These were sold anonymously at Christie's, 27 November 1953 (158), and both were bought as one lot by Roland, Browse and Delbanco for 20 gns. The oil <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/painting" title="Glossary definition for 'Painting'"><span>painting</span></a>, <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/canvas" title="Glossary definition for 'Canvas'"><span>canvas</span></a>, 24×48 in., is signed ‘Ethel Walker’ b.l. and agrees in almost every detail with <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/walker-decoration-the-excursion-of-nausicaa-n03885" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N03885</span></a>. The watercolour sold with it, 19 3/4×38 1/2 in., is exactly the same <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/composition" title="Glossary definition for 'Composition'"><span>composition</span></a> as <span>N03885</span>, and in February 1957 belonged to Professor Francis Wormald. This is almost certainly the watercolour exhibited at Agnew's in February–April 1938 (18), and Miss Grace English noted (typescript MS.) that on 1 February 1938 Dame Ethel Walker planned to paint another ‘Nausicaa and Her Maidens’ from an imperial size watercolour sketch then on show at Agnew's. The same watercolour may also have been that shown in the exhibition <i>Ethel Walker: New Paintings</i>, Lefevre Gallery, April 1939 (38). At the N.E.A.C., winter 1938 (214), the artist showed ‘Decoration: Nausicaa and her Maidens’, probably the oil.</p>
<p><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, <i>The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture</i>, London 1964, II
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-10-05T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
actions: postures and motions actions: processes and functions adults animals: mammals bending forward carrying / holding classical myths: gods and heroes domestic female food and drink fruit - non-specific goat group groups jug kneeling laundering Nausicaa nudes objects people religion and belief vessels and containers woman work and occupations