Artist: Christopher Wood
Date: 1922
Medium: Gouache on paper
Dimensions: 74 x 99 cm
Credit: Towner Collection, the Lucy Wertheim Bequest. Image Towner Eastbourne
Christopher Wood was born near Liverpool and is known for his association with the St Ives artists. He exhibited with Ben and Winifred Nicholson at the Beaux Arts Gallery in 1927 and became close friends with both. During a visit to St Ives with Nicholson, Wood encountered the fisherman and painter Alfred Wallis and was inspired by this naïve approach and it helped him to establish his own way of painting. Wood’s style was also influenced by his friendships with Picasso and Cocteau, with whom he spent time in Provence and Paris.
Fair at Neuilly (now a western suburb of Paris) is a depiction of a lively village celebrating a typical rural holiday.