Vincent Haddelsley Retrospective Exhibition Brochure

VINCENT HADDELSEY
1934 – 2010
SAM SCORER GALLERY
April 15th – April 27th 2014
VINCENT HADDELSEY
1934 - 2010
Born in Grimsby in 1934, Vincent Haddelsey was a self-taught artist who acquired a love of horses at a young age and
travelled the world in pursuit of his subject matter.
He studied horses and landscapes in Mongolia, China, India and Chile, participated in the rodeo in Mexico, rode with
hounds in Europe and show jumped in England and Canada, all the time painting the scenes he saw.
Preferring to be known as an ‘equestrian painter’ rather than an artist, he exhibited widely, wrote and collaborated
on books about his work, and has paintings included in the Royal collection among others. He died in Paris in
August 2010.
Now a retrospective exhibition of paintings and prints is being held at the Sam Scorer Gallery on Drury Street,
Lincoln, from April 14th to 22nd, 2014. It is a rare chance to view the work of this fascinating artist.
Born in Bargate, Grimsby on April 13th 1934, Vincent Haddelsey grew up in Westwood Ho! with his father Sam, who
was a solicitor, and mother Mary Lucy (nee Tierney). At the end of the Second World War, his father took the post of
Registrar to the County Courts in Lincoln and the family moved to Canwick House in Canwick, near Lincoln.
Vincent had the freedom of the stables and learned much from the game keeper Cyril Willows. He enjoyed riding
out with the Blankney Hunt and being on foot with the Cranwell Beagles and learning the trade of game keeping
first hand. (Vincent was about seven-years-old when he first rode a horse at his cousin Cavill Lowish’s farm in
Barnetby le Wold.)
As a boy, he was sent to boarding school at Ampleforth in Yorkshire. Vincent’s son Philip said: “The trapping and
shooting skills acquired in Canwick were put to good use at school.
“Vincent and a close group of friends, Michael Birch and Chris Clapham in St. Thomas Boarding House at
Ampleforth, would earn enough money through selling trapped and shot game to afford to hire a taxi to take them to
York all day on occasions.
“By the time he was a senior at Ampleforth, he somehow had a horse at his disposal. He was once reprimanded for
returning back to his boarding house close to midnight on horseback. His much respected and loved house master,
Father Dennis, was waiting patiently for him and on arrival told to ‘get off the horse and get to bed’.”
Both Vincent’s grandmothers were painters and as a child, he began drawing fine detailed pictures with a pen, and
later painted in oils. He loved to record the countryside around him.
Philip said: “At an early age, Vincent drew detailed, busy pictures of horses and military figures in a style which most
would not associate with his work today. He was greatly influenced by the imagery of Thomas Rowlandson and the
period of the 18th century which he lived in. He would have seen this work in a family book dating back to his great
aunt from the 1860s, ‘Dr Syntax’s Three Tours’.”
By the time Vincent was 18, he was inspired by a visit to the school by someone who had just returned from the West
Coast of Canada. Philip added: “His imagination was fired when he was told that Canada was a raw land which had
hardly been touched so he sold his James Comet 98cc motor cycle and used the money to buy his ticket to Canada.”
After landing in Vancouver, Vincent travelled up the coast and worked in a lumberjack camp. His cousin Margaret
Lunt recalled: “Vincent worked in the canteen in the camp, helping to dish out the food to the men and he slept in
the camp as well. He told me that sometimes he was very frightened because he was fresh out of school and some of
the men had knives and fought. He began to sketch and draw the scenes around him, like he’d done at school in the
margins of his books, and he realised what he wanted to do in his life.”
Vincent’s desire to be an artist was met with disapproval by his father who did not see it as a secure way to make a
living. (He came from a long line of solicitors including his father’s father and great-grandfather). But Vincent was
undeterred, saving his pay to buy the materials and time to paint.
While in Canada in the 1950s, Vincent developed a lifelong friendship with Chief Gordon Robinson, the Haisla
Native Canadian Chief who lived in Terrace, British Colombia. The Haisla First Nation primarily reside in
Kitamaat Village.
At the time, Vincent was reproducing traditional Haida and Haisla art forms in paint on board with the approval of
the Chief. He also illustrated the ‘Tales of Kitamaat’ book.
Phillip said: “Vincent illustrated the ‘Tales of Kitamaat’ book which was very close to his heart. Gordon said in later
years before his death: ‘You are the only white man who has ever kept in touch’.”
After several years, Vincent left Canada for the West Coast of America, travelling to New Mexico to experience rodeo
riding on horses and bulls and on to El Paso before taking a ship home.
Whilst in America, Vincent met Carol who was working in the French Embassy at the time and was on her
last holiday before returning home. After marrying in Paris, the couple lived in Canada; Vincent worked as a
journalist in a local newspaper to earn a living. The couple had two children, Veronique and Phillip, and returned to
live in Grimsby.
But Vincent’s interest in horses led him to travel extensively to study and paint the animals in their native settings.
Phillip, who describes his father as ‘truly a man of the horse’, said: “He travelled the globe to find and participate in
every practical activity to do with the horse and was brave enough to meet all these challanges head on.
“He rode rodeo bulls and horses in Mexico, was steeplechasing in the late 1970s, rode to hounds in England, France
and Italy, show jumped in England and Canada and travelled to China, Mongolia, India, Mexico, the USA, Chile,
Hungary, Italy, France and across the UK.”
In the early days, it was John Danby Wheeldon, who owned The Strait Gallery on Lincoln’s Steep Hill from the 1940s
until 1988 and was also an art teacher, who Vincent first approached to sell his work after very briefly attending the
Lincoln School of Art. John’s son Tim Wheeldon, who also ran the gallery with his brother Robin and is a painting
conservationist, explained that Vincent was a family friend – John’s sister had stables at Canwick and Vincent would
ride from there and also went out with the Blankney Hunt with other family members.
Tim said: “He didn’t get on very well at the School of Art and went to see my father with a view to selling his
paintings. My father told him to go to London and approach a gallery there. He went to Tooth, a major gallery
specialising in impressionist paintings, and they took him on straight away. His work sold to major collectors in
America, Italy and Switzerland.
“He would travel the world and was usually commissioned to do a painting for a hunt or a Viscount or an estate.
Sometimes he was asked to include a particular horse in the painting and would live on site while he was working.”
Phillip agreed that Vincent’s real breakthrough into the art world was with Nicholas and Andy Tooth. He said:
“Nicholas was the first person to take his work seriously in the early 1960s and from that point he was accepted
as a painter.”
Although much of Vincent’s original work was sold through agents, Tim’s family sold many of his limited edition
lithographs (these were mostly made by Christies Contemporary Art, directed by David Case and printed in Paris),
some original artwork and signed books through their gallery.
He said: “A lot of his pictures had Lincoln themes; there was a huge lithograph of the racecourse looking towards the
Cathedral and another of the Lincolnshire Showground.
“His colour lithographs were made in specialist print shop in France where a plate would be used to print one colour
and then eight or 10 plates would be overprinted to build up the painting. It was all done by hand and to very limited
numbers of say 75 or 250 pieces, each one was signed by the artist.”
Over the years, Vincent attended Tim and Christine’s wedding in 1978 and their 20th anniversary at Branston Hall.
Tim added: “Vincent was a one off. He was totally outgoing and would meet anyone from a farmhand to Royalty and
be just the same with both. He would send marvellous letters to my wife Christine, my father and I from wherever he
was in the world, illustrated with pen and ink drawings, and we had telephone conversations which went on for hours.”
Tim recalled that the Usher Gallery holds several of Vincent’s works and that more recently there was a possibility of
him receiving a commissioned from the committee of the Usher Gallery Trust to paint an image of ‘Lincoln at Play’ to
counterbalance a work by Lowry titled ‘Lincoln’.
Tim said: “The Lowry entitled ‘Lincoln’ had been given to the Usher Gallery Trust and showed people coming out of
factories on Waterside South with the Cathedral in the background. Vincent’s painting was to show Lincoln at play
with people on the racecourse on Carholme Road with the Cathedral in the background.
“He was in France at that time and was trying to do some research for the painting. He made some enquiries at the
Lincolnshire Echo for illustrations of what the racecourse would have been like when it was still open and he may
have made some sketches as well but unfortunately his health had deteriorated so much by that time he couldn’t
complete the painting.”
Vincent had a huge output of work to be remembered by nevertheless. Margaret recalls that his work was very well
received in Europe, adding: “His work became really well-known in Europe, particularly in Switzerland and France
where they liked his ‘naïve’ style of painting.”
His son Phillip recalls his father working in several mediums including pencil, pen and ink, watercolour, copper
sculpture, enamel on copper and silver, silver and copper jewellery, painting on river stones, wooden boxes and bone,
pen and ink on tree bark, acid etched copper sculpture and jewellery, murals and paintings onto domestic walls,
copper engraving and prints, lino and wood cuts, bold portraits and oil and acrylic painting on canvas and board.
He said: “He had great social skills and was attractive and naturally charming which opened doors across the world.
In many ways he was a product of Ampleforth but at the same time he was very much his own man.
“Although fiercely ambitious and self-motivated, he was rather self-effacing about his artistic ability, and never really
gave himself much credit for his success.
“He thought that people mainly liked his work because they perhaps felt that they themselves could do it, and that
made it accessible to them. In fact he did not find it easy and put a huge amount of work into each painting.
“He is mainly known as a Naive or primitive English equestrian painter which denies him his true worth.”
Throughout his career, he had exhibited widely and his work is included in many collections across the world,
including the Royal collection. Some of his work is catalogued in the Bridgeman Art Library.
Phillip recalls that his most notable copper sculpture was a commission for the Guildford Youth Centre which was
five life-sized copper figures reaching up to a sun. He said: “They were hung on the outside of the building and
received some attention in the press at that time. All that remains is the scaled down model which I still have.”
Phillips proudest moment was being commissioned by his father to paint birds and woodland creatures for a
painting that Vincent had been commissioned to paint in the mid-1980s for the Intercontinental Hotel at Hyde Park
Corner in London.
He said: “It was a three panel painting about 20 feet long, a huge undertaking for him. I was in a unique a very
privileged position to be asked to collaborate with him on it.
“He commissioned me to paint 10 birds, a squirrel and a hedgehog and help with some of the background painting.
It was a well spirited and harmonious arrangement which benefitted us both.
“I am a domestic electrician by trade and do not have any great aptitude in art and painting but was capable enough
to blend in my work with his to his great approval.”
The Hunt and hounds
Vincent’s personal life led him to end his life in Paris with Leila, his partner of over 40 years. Margaret said: “Leila was
always wonderful to Vincent, helping with his exhibitions and keeping him focused.”
Sadly, Vincent died in a residential home in Paris in August 2010 and his ashes were buried in the Monks’ private
cemetery at Ampleforth Abbey in Yorkshire.
Polo match, Belvoir Castle
Cloverdale stampede
Point to point
VINCENT HADDELSEY
Home by moonlight
Cover Image
‘The Blankney at Canwick Hall’
Catalogue Essay
Sarah Winstanley
Photographs
Kirsty Young mnava
Exhibition Printing
Ruddocks, Lincoln
Exhibition Support
Golding Young & Mawer
Special thanks to
Margaret Lunt
Philip Haddelsey
John Osbourne
Ian Walter
Luke McDonald
Tim Wheeldon
Mollie Wallhead
Logistics
Lowes Removals
County show
- Belvoir Castle
Kings troops rehearsing before the
Lincolnshire show
Coldstream
Specialist Art Auctions
Enquiries
William Gregory MRICS
Golding Young & Mawer
are proud to support The
Sam Scorer Gallery and
the Vincent Haddelsey
exhibition
Lucien Pissarro (1863-1944) sold for £11,000
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The organisers would
like to acknowledge
the following for their
help and sponsorship
of this exhibition: