Bottoms up: Pub-themed stained glass set to raise the bar at Bedfordshire auction
A stained-glass panel depicting a raucous pub scene has an estimate of £3,500-£4,500 at Hanson Ross’s sale in Woburn on November 15.
Created by the renowned Scottish maker William Wilson (1905-1972), as a one-off piece, it has been in the same family since it was gifted by the artist himself.
Wilson gave the panel to the mother of his friend, the self-taught printmaker Edgar Holloway (1914- 2008), to thank her for putting him up.
Depicting three drinkers and a dartboard possibly in a pub, the lively composition, measuring 44cm x 33cm, contrasts with the religious compositions for which Wilson is best known.
Rather than a biblical theme, the central panel shows a hand clasping two darts, opposite a pipe-smoking man wearing a hat.
Edgar Holloway’s mother gave the work to her cousin, who later passed it on to the wife of the current vendor, who lives in Buckinghamshire.
Martyn Garrod, from Soulbury, said: “Apparently my aunt didn’t like it. We like it a great deal, but unfortunately it doesn’t suit where we live so we have made the difficult decision to sell it.”
Like many of the best 20th-century Scottish artists Wilson didn’t restrict himself to one genre, becoming skilled in three.
Having trained at the Edinburgh stained-glass studio of James Ballantine and Son, Wilson started out at as a talented printmaker and later watercolourist. He met Yorkshire-born Holloway in London 1935, when both artists were part of the interwar “etching boom”.
The pair travelled together in the UK and Europe, even setting up a printworks in Essex in 1936 for which they bought their own printing press.
On his travels Wilson kept a keen eye on his first love, sketching the stained glass in churches, museums and galleries. His return to Scotland saw him teaching stained glass making at Edinburgh College of Art before opening his own studio in 1937,
Between 1945 and 1970 he executed up to 150 church windows with his largest surviving set of windows is at Craigiebuckler church, Aberdeen.
As well as religious stained glass, Wilson created secular pieces including The Irish Jig originally situated in Wilson's home in Belford Mews, Edinburgh.
The composition revolves around the central figure of a fiddler, surrounded by carousers, with a dog barking at the bottom.
Kim Wood, a valuer at Hansons Ross, which is offering the panel at its sale at the Woburn Hotel, said: “Wilson created these secular pieces as a break from his more prolific religious offerings, as such they are both rare and beautiful. The colours and style are reminiscent of contemporary Scottish art, as well as works by the Glasgow painter Ian Fleming with whom Wilson was a close friend. It is a terrific piece with an astounding providence.”
Wilson’s career was cut short by blindness in 1962, as a complication from diabetes, meaning one of his last windows, the stained-glass image of St Columba in the Abbey Church, Iona may have been completed by assistants.
His glass commissions can be found in Canterbury Cathedral, Glasgow Cathedral, St Salvador's Chapel , St Andrew Square in Edinburgh.
His work can also be seen in America, New Zealand, South Africa and Canada.