L.S. Lowry RA 1887-1976

A Footbridge, 1944

Oil on Board
12 x 16 ins (30.48 x 40.64 cms)
Signed and Dated

Price on application

Provenance

Lefevre Gallery London
Private Collection
Philips Sale, London, 17th June 1977, lot 66
Private Collection
Christies sale, London, 9th June, 2006
Richard Green, London
Private Collection
Clark Art Ltd
Private Collection

Exhibition History

London, Lefevre Gallery, Paintings by L.S. Lowry. Feb-Mar 1945 No 6
London, Richard Green, L.S. Lowry - A Collectors Choice. May 2004 No 6

Literature

Shelley Rohde, L.S. Lowry - A Life. Haus Books, London, 2007. This painting is the dust-jacket image.

General Notes

Painted in 1944, in this work Lowry has combined a depiction of industrial England, with the train crossing the viaduct and smoking chimneys beyond, with a figurative scene of children playing in the foreground. The main subject of this painting is the Pack Saddle or Roving Bridge which spans the Manchester, Bolton and Bury Canal, where it is joined by the Fletcher Canal in Clifton.
This bridge seems to symbolise the lonely and isolated, a constant theme in Lowry's work. Here it spans the canal which was for a brief period the arterial network of Britain's industry. Instead, by the date that this work was painted, the canal as a form of transport had been superceeded by the railway network.