THE ARMITT ACQUIRES KURT SCHWITTERS PORTRAIT OF AMBLESIDE RESIDENT JOHN MACKERETH
The artwork was purchased at auction with support from the Arts Council England/V&A Purchase Grant fund, the Art Fund and private donors.
In 1937, he was forced to flee Nazi persecution with his son Ernst. He fled to Norway, then the UK where he was imprisoned in various internment camps until he was freed in 1941. He first lived in London, then spent the last two and half years of his life in Ambleside.
The sitter of the portrait is John Mackereth, a chemist based in Ambleside in the 1940s. Schwitters often painted pictures to pay bills and settle debts with his neighbours. This portrait was created in exchange for clothing from the local haberdashery run by Mackereth’s parents. However, apparently, the Mackereths chose a different landscape painting of the foot of Helm Crag to settle the bill.
Manager & Curator for The Armitt, Faye Morrissey, said: “It’s fantastic to be able to announce that The Armitt has been successful in acquiring another artwork by Kurt Schwitters. We are pleased to add this portrait to the collection so that we can continue to present Schwitters’ story in the area as well as highlight local people and their activities in Ambleside. What is more, the portrait is a fabulous example of Schwitters’ reuse of materials as there is a glazed newspaper collage on the reverse, carefully retained by the previous owners”.