Flowering butch - floral paintings by Gluck

 

Lords and Ladies, 1936.

Convolvulous, 1937.

Lilies, 1936.

The Pine Cone, 1919.

Nature Morte, 1937.

Lilac and Guelder Rose, circa 1932-37.

The Vernon Picture, 1937.

The Devil's Altar, 1932.

Chromatic, 1932.

Tulips, circa 1930-32.

Orchestra, 1967.

*

Gluck (born Hannah Gluckstein; 13 August 1895, London – 10 January 1978, Steyning, Sussex), British painter, best known for portraits and floral paintings. (Gluck rejected any forename or honorific, such as "Miss" or "Mr.", and also used the names Peter and Hig, so it seems right to assume the pronouns they/them.) Born into a wealthy Jewish family, they attended the Dame School in Swiss Cottage until 1910, and then at St Paul's Girls' School in Hammersmith until 1913; that year, they were awarded a Royal Drawing Society silver star. They attended St John's Wood School of Art between 1913 and 1916, after which they moved to the west Cornwall valley of Lamorna, joining the artists' colony there. At Lamorna the artist began to adopt a masculine appearance and to defy fashion and gender norms. Their relationships with a number of women included one with Nesta Obermer; the artist's joint self-portrait with Obermer, Medallion, is viewed as an iconic lesbian statement. They identified with no artistic school or movement and showed work only in solo exhibitions; they were supported financially by family money. Though the artist's work was well-received both by critics and the public through the 1920s and 1930s, beginning in 1944 as their relationship with Obermer was ending, they endured a nearly thirty-year period of "artist's block." In their seventies, the artist began painting again and mounted one last well-received solo show, and died not too long after at the age of eighty-two.

Medallion (YouWe), her self-portrait with Nesta Obermer, 1936.

*

Image from the original patent of the Gluck Frame.

Gluck is also remembered as an inventor. They debuted a new design for a picture frame in 1932, the same year at their third exhibition at the London Fine Art Society. The Gluck frame is a geometric three-tier stepped frame, with the steps rising from the exterior of the frame towards the interior. The intent of the inventor was that the frame could be painted or wallpapered, covered in the same material as the wall upon which the painting was hung, causing the painting to almost appear to be part of the wall. The first Gluck frames were constructed out of soft plasticine, although later frames were constructed out of wood.

Self-portrait, 1942.