Reginald Brill, 1902 - 1974
An extremely interesting artist, about whom I feel we do not yet know enough, despite the very readable book on his work by Judith Bumpus, published in 1999. This rightly emphasises that it is his supreme draughtsmanship that shines out from Brill’s work – and this must, in part, be explained by his training under Henry Tonks at the Slade, in 1921-4. Few other schools at the time insisted so intently on teaching students to draw, regularly and from life, and note and recall every characteristic, every bend and twist, every shadow and gleam of light, which they witnessed. But, by the time Brill reached the Slade, he had earlier studied at Harrogate School of Art and, thereafter, pursued evening classes in St. Martin’s School of Art, in London. Thus, as a young man, he was already a well-rounded artist. Intriguingly, one of Brill’s first professional jobs was to produce illustrations for Labour MP George Lansbury’s Labour Weekly, launched in 1925 as a radical paper and, in the short term, very successful (though ceased publication in 1927). I was thrilled to discover that this paper examined not only the politics and economics of Britain: in 1927, the cover of the newspaper celebrated the black leader of the South African ICU (Industrial and Commercial Workers’ Union of Africa), a dominant political figure in the 1920s. And, on the front page of Labour Weekly, 12th March, 1927, there is a powerful image of Clements Kadalie himself: drawn by none other than Reginald Brill.
It might seem something of a surprise then, that, in 1927, Brill - having been awarded the Prix de Rome - and his new wife, Rosalie, also an artist, set off to study at the British School in Rome. This must have offered a very exciting opportunity to them both. One might imagine that the BSR pursued a limited, conservative, academic training, versed in the Graeco-Roman tradition; and, to some extent, this would be true. But, it was also renowned as a centre for interdisciplinary research: studying the past as a means of exchanging ideas about the future, examining philosophies, exploring art, archaeology and architecture from many different eras – and, in the process, learning about the lives and backgrounds of students from all over Britain and other English-speaking peoples, and all this at a time when, in so many walks of life in Britain, such an exhilarating mix of ideas and people was rare indeed. The numerous, evocative, drawings and paintings of Italy certainly reveal that these years instilled in Brill a deep love of the light, sunshine, architecture and countryside of Italy; but, by the late 1920s, political and social unrest was a growing threat in Italy, taking shape in the Fascism of Mussolini and his blackshirts. In 1929, the Brills returned home.
In the following year, the Brills set off again on their travels, this time to Egypt for six months, having been invited by the Egyptian Government to paint in Cairo. It’s worth recalling that Egypt was one of the earliest non-European destinations to attract tourists, having been been part of Thomas Cook’s portfolio since the 19th century. Moreover, since 1882, the country had been occupied by British forces and British officials dominated the civil service. Brill’s paintings and drawings reveal a fascination with the mosques, cafes, markets and people of Egypt (he was obviously in his element, even painting a self-portrait in a fez). He was responsive to the distinctive architecture of the country – particularly its mosques, so often a wonderful mixture of Oriental, Classical and Renaissance styles, rich in colour and atmosphere. The resulting exhibition was, it seems, a great success and provided the funds for the Brills to travel home via the Greek islands and Italy. An even more significant and lasting legacy of the visit to Egypt was Brill’s meeting with a particularly well-connected British resident, Major Robert Gayer-Anderson.
Robert Gayer-Anderson, a doctor, worked in the Royal Army Medical Corps, seconded to the Egyptian Army in 1906. He retired in 1924 and continued to live in Cairo (dubbed a ‘Pasha’) until returning to Britain in 1942, where he had a house with his twin brother in Lavenham, Suffolk, called 'Little Hall'. The friendship between Brill and Gayer-Anderson was later to prove extremely important to the development of the painter’s career. But, back in London, Brill’s first major one-man show in Britain was held at the Leicester Galleries, London, in April 1933, and, in the following year, he was appointed Head of the School of Art in Kingston-upon-Thames. Brill embarked on a programme of improving the quality of the teaching and the facilities in the School, enlarging its reputation. At the same time, he was experimenting with his own work, focusing not only on portraits, watercolour landscapes and botanical drawings, but also on developing studies for several, large-scale oil paintings, depicting - and commenting on, with a view shaped by Lansbury’s utopian socialism? - the lives of working men (and, indeed, unemployed men, but very few women). These pictures formed part of what Brill described as his Martyrdom of Man series. Each painting was preceded by a time-consuming set of individual drawings, increasingly simplified, often exploring a technique with an almost Pointillist style of building-up his compositions - in line and mass, light and shade - with tiny dots of pen and ink, pencil, charcoal and wash, lending these studies a powerful heft, conjured by a wealth of tones of silver, grey and black: an auctioneer, a bellringer, a stockman, a gardener, a bowls player, a nightwatchman. Some of these drawings were then brought together, elaborately squared and scaled up into paintings where the pared-back forms and very subtle array of closely-toned hues revealed a technique deeply influenced by his drawings. His methodical approach to constructing a figurative composition might have been very traditional, even revealing Brill’s admiration for Renaissance paintings, which were so important a part of his studies at the BSR – but his images are also infused with the monumental, simplified, Classicism of early Picasso, and other radical artists, such as William Roberts and Stanley Spencer. These are large and powerful pictures, on which Brill built a reputation, both before and after the War: from the later 1930s, we find A Surgical Operation, now in the Wellcome Collection, and Unemployed, now in the Tate. From the post-War years, there is the outstanding Rest, a picture of construction workers recovering from their labours, and now also in the Tate.
In 1962, Brill retired from the post of Principal at Kingston. Thereafter, he took up an appointment to run the Gayer-Anderson Hostel for art students, in Little Hall, Lavenham, Suffolk – the home of his old friends, the Gayer-Andersons, whom Brill had regularly visited over the years and whom he had persuaded to leave the Hall to Surrey Council, for the use of students from Kingston School of Art. Though the hostel closed in 1969, Brill remained at Little Hall until his death on 14 June 1974.
Throughout his long and very varied career, which had involved much teaching and management at Kingston and at Lavenham, Brill had continued to explore and develop his own art, exhibiting widely, especially at the RA. His emphasis on figurative art, on portraiture, on the humanity of work and the variety of workers and his insistence on building his compositions in a methodical - a traditional - way means that he stands out from many of his contemporaries. Even more distinctive - and, perhaps, even more English - is his preoccupation with the history and humanity of his subjects. So many of his pictures reveal a deep and very perceptive understanding of his sitters; so often there is wit, individuality, even eccentricity; and always there is a sense of valuing - I would go so far as to say loving - each of the people and places he embraced with his art.
© Dr. Hilary Taylor, 2025