We went this afternoon to the Paul Nash exhibition at Tate Britain. We felt he was never completely convincing as a painter – a bit too dry, too graphic, and as the exhibition demonstrates, a bit too susceptible to outside influences. I was pleased to discover on getting home that I have a copy of his Shell Guide to Dorset, which I see I bought rather expensively and is in shabby condition (Travel and Topography is housed in a damp cupboard). It is illustrated on the title page with a picture of a Scelidosaurus, which one is presumably unlikely to run into in Dorset, even in the 1930s, includes a section on SPORT by Brigadier-General F.R. Patch with a listing of all the golf courses, and is dedicated to THE LANDOWNERS OF DORSET, THE COUNCIL FOR THE PRESERVATION OF RURAL ENGLAND, THE SOCIETY FOR THE PROTECTION OF ANCIENT BUILDINGS AND ALL THOSE COURAGEOUS ENEMIES OF ‘DEVELOPMENT’ TO WHOM WE OWE WHAT IS LEFT OF ENGLAND.
| Charles | Saumarez | Smith | 
But I love some of his pictures of trees, that is where he excels.
But he was a true poet and had something much British art lacked then.
(Bloomsbury art for instance?)
Dear Dick, Are you sure ? Maybe in his early work. Then, he worked for Omega. I don’t find the war work has much passion. Charles
The best of the first world war – we are making a new world – and second world war paintings are beautiful, ironic, savage, disturbing, and altogether extraordinary, in my opinion, it is terrific we all have differing views. John Nash is regularly championed by those knowledgable and scholarly dealers such as Paul Liss and the Fine Art Society.