Why is the Figures collection important?

Lowry’s distinctive figures have come down to criticism with the name of “matchstick men”. This is due to their very stylised, unrealistic, and slim figure, which seems to produce little to no shadows on the surrounding environment. While his earlier works are populated by these monotonous crowds of look-alike men and women, the 1930s marked an important shift in the artist’s production, and led Lowry to produce a series of haunting portraits. These portraits are permeated by dark tones and eerie atmospheres, which possibly reflected the artist’s personal difficulties following Lowry’s father’s death in 1932 and the long-term sickness that was haunting Lowry’s mother.

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Figures by L. S. Lowry Background & Meaning

Figures

Though known largely for his stylised, two-dimensional ‘matchstick men,’ L.S. Lowry’s Figures series demonstrates his real skill as a portrait painter. Having received less attention historically than his Industrial Scenes, scholars have recently begun reappraising Lowry as a portraitist—unsurprising, given the charming candidness of his Figures.

Meaning & Analysis

Though known largely for his stylised, two-dimensional ‘matchstick men,’ Lowry’s Figures series demonstrates his real skill as portrait painter. S. Lowry was also a skilled portraitist. His portraits have received less critical attention than his Industrial Scenes or his Town and Street Scenes, but recent trends in scholarship have been focusing on reappraising Lowry as an underrated portraitist, opening the door for newly-found appreciation of the artist.

One of the epitomes that stuck with Lowry the most, to the artist’s admittance, was that of being a naive “Sunday painter”. While Lowry is now widely and critically appreciated as one of the most meaningful British artists of the 20th century, this critical appraisal was not always as strong. Initially, Lowry’s stylised and repetitive depictions of the North, which his paintings have come to visually signify, were dismissed as the work of a skill-less amateurish artist. Lowry, however, was dedicated to his craft and spent most of his nights painting and training under the Impressionist painter Adolphe Valette. While many have already claimed that Lowry’s choice of colour palette shares little with the Impressionist love for colours, Lowry and Impressionist painters nonetheless shared a fascination for stylised depictions of people entertaining themselves in the urban environment, suffice to think of Gustave Caillebotte's Le Ponte De l’Europe, which has been the focus of much recent interest and different exhibitions.

Lowry’s distinctive figures have come down to criticism with the name of “matchstick men”. This is due to their very stylised, unrealistic, and slim figure, which seems to produce little to no shadows on the surrounding environment. While his earlier works are populated by these monotonous crowds of look-alike men and women, the 1930s marked an important shift in the artist’s production, and led Lowry to produce a series of haunting portraits. These portraits are permeated by dark tones and eerie atmospheres, which possibly reflected the artist’s personal difficulties following Lowry’s father’s death in 1932 and the long-term sickness that was haunting Lowry’s mother.
The mood of these first portraits, however, soon changed after the end of the Second World War, when Lowry adopted a much more colourful palette and began integrating his portraits more and more into his cityscapes. Unlike his earlier cityscapes, populated by working-class crowds preoccupied with their daily laborious tasks, these later artworks depict people at play. This shift in production reflected the overall joy following the end of the War, and also attested to the proliferation of leisure time, which soon became a subject matter for much of the art and art historical writings produced in those same years.
While only recently Lowry’s interest in portraiture came to the fore, even a brief overlook of his production evidences and highlights the artist’s receptiveness to his surroundings and the changing historical circumstances, which he always strove to translate visually into his art. Thus, Lowry’s portraits confirm the artist’s so-called social realism, and attest to an incredibly socially and historically-aware artistic production.
If you're looking to sell art by L S Lowry, click the link and we can help. We employ a number of techniques and practices in order to give a realistic and achievable valuation on any art listed on myartbroker.com. We analyse the demand for the work in question, take into consideration previous sales and auction valuations, we assess the current gallery valuation and monitor the current deals taking place via MyArtBroker every day. We regularly advise sellers on a price bracket for their artwork completely free of charge.

Figures

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Figures

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Meaning & Analysis

Why is the Figures collection important?

How do I buy a Figures print?

How can I sell my Figures print?

Notable Collections

Google reviews

4.9

Natalie Boren

Rodrigo Garcia

Rick Stevens

Mike Wood

tondeggi

Alexa Easterby

About

Contact

Sell Your Art
with Us