TOM EDWIN MOSTYN
1864 – 1930 British
Winter
Oil on canvas
Signed
Further signed, dated ’92
Titled & inscribed on canvas verso
Original gilt exhibition frame
Exhibited: Walker Art Gallery, Manchester 1892

Tom Mostyn, the son of the artist Edwin Mostyn, studied at the Manchester Academy of Fine Arts. He had his first local exhibition in 1880, and was showing at the Royal Academy by the age of 29. He is mainly recognised for his romantic garden scenes, although his style was so eclectic throughout his career that it is hard to believe that the same artist created all of his paintings. His earliest paintings were highly influenced by the strong anti-"Victorian Materialist" sentiment of his teacher Sir Hubert Von Herkomer (whose school he entered in 1892). The present painting Winter is typical of Mostyn’s early works and depicted the poverty of the working classes in the style of the realists, an effective way of raising social consciousness. Among his most important works exhibited at the Royal Academy from this period are The Torrent (R.A. 1895), The Dreamers (R.A. 1897) and The Doss-house (R.A. 1905).
In 1918 after WWI Tom Mostyn moved to Devon, where leaving realism behind he began a series of enchanted garden scenes for which he would become best known.
Mostyn exhibited at the Royal Academy, and was a member of the Royal Institute of Oil Painters, The Royal Cambrian Academy, and the Royal West of England Academy. He also exhibited in the Paris Salon, and at the Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh.
Winter is a rare and powerful early realist work by Tom Mostyn depicting fagot gatherers in harsh winter conditions. Presented in original exhibition frame.

Stock Number: kt143/win11
£6,500

Height: 32 in / 81.28 cm
Width: 44 in / 111.76 cm