Of all the artists with connections to Swindon, Paul Rudall is one of the most interesting, and one of the most unfairly ignored. Museum and Art Swindon recently acquired several paintings by Rudall, including Distant Red, which is currently on display in our exhibition Art on Our Doorstep.
Paul Rudall was born in West London in 1921 and moved to Swindon in 1941 after his family home was destroyed in the Blitz. He joined the Swindon Contemporary Art Society and became friends with local luminaries like Desmond Morris and Diana Dors. In 1947 he held a solo exhibition at Swindon Arts Centre. He later studied at Corsham Court and went on to become Head of Art at grammar schools in Chiswick and then Dudley. He retired to Bath in 1982, where he lived – and painted – until his death in 2012.
Rudall worked consistently within modernist modes and themes. While his adherence to modernism was admirably staunch, his interpretation of it was generous and wide-ranging. It is no great stretch to say that some of his best paintings have a Picasso-like quality. Many of his works, like Picasso’s, occupy a hinterland between representation and pure abstraction. His musical instruments and nudes treat figure and form as suggestion rather than absolute truth. His landscapes are enigmatic, sometimes verging on the surreal, sometimes recognisable.
One of the most striking paintings in the recent acquisition is Distant Red. Though a casual glance might suggest that it is an entirely abstract work, the right-angled forms represent buildings (domesticity was to become an increasingly important theme in Rudall’s later work). While the red disc might suggest a partly abstracted sun or a mysterious celestial object, its primary function is to alter the viewer’s perceptions. Rudall believed that dots and circles could cause subtle shifts in the way we see a work of art, and he used them in many of his paintings.
Paul Rudall, ‘Distant Red’, 1989, Oil paint on board, Courtesy of the Artist’s Estate
Although Rudall is now less well-known than some of his near-contemporaries like Graham Sutherland and Ben Nicholson, his contribution to the growth of modernist art in the UK is arguably just as important. The post-war art scene was largely conservative, viewing experimentation with disdain or fear, but Rudall was always unconcerned with the restrictions of the establishment or the vagaries of the market, creating art in his own way and on his own terms. Swindon should be proud of the part it played in his long and distinguished career.
Thomas Blake, Visitor Experience Assistant at Museum & Art Swindon
