William Page Atkinson Wells
William Wells c1911: From the collection of Yvonne Wells.
Born Glasgow in 1872 and died Appledore, Devon 1923. ‘He never dressed up like an itinerant photographer’.
Introduction
For several summers between c.1903 and 1909, the artist William Wells lived at Sunderland Point and created many wonderful paintings. This month, May 2023, is the centenary of his death. We wanted to know a lot more about him.
At the peak of his career, he was in the first rank of British landscape painters and featured in highly popular ‘one-man’ shows across Britain and major cities abroad. His pictures were eagerly purchased especially in the West of Scotland, the place of his birth.
A Lancashire Village 1908: Courtesy City of Edinburgh museums
We already have this famous painting on the website, and no wonder, it’s great. In glorious colour and superb detail, it’s a glimpse of Sunderland Point as it was over a century ago.
It is also a very important picture. When first shown at the Glasgow Royal Institute the Fine Arts in 1909, it was the sensation of the year (Scots Pictorial,1913) and a significant milestone in establishing his reputation as a painter of the highest ability.
The years at Sunderland Point were transformative, it’s here Wells developed his techniques and learned to focus his creative talents into works of art that earned a glittering reputation.
Early life
Wells was born in Blythswood, Glasgow in 1872, the eldest son of Andrew Wells and Margaret Atkinson.
By all accounts, his father Andrew Wells was a colourful character as well as a highly talented man. A gifted furniture craftsperson, a maker of stained-glass windows and creator of major public and private decorative works. He also wrote and published a book of poetry (we have examples of his poetry but decided best left out…...)
In 1886 Andrew emigrated with his family to Australia to work for the renowned stained glass artist Daniel Cottier in his decorative interiors and furnishings businesses in Sydney and Melbourne.
After ten years Andrew Wells returned to Glasgow to become a director of Guthrie, Wells & Co, decorators, dealers, and makers of stained glass. In the 1890s it was the most prestigious firm of its kind in Glasgow receiving commissions from leading architects including Charles Rennie Mackintosh.
Guthrie and Wells advertisement: Glasgow dated 1905.
Early years and professional training
In 1881, when William Wells was 9, the family moved to Newton Terrace, Glasgow. A short walk away lived his aunt Marion with her husband, Robert Reid and their eight children, one of whom, Helen Gordon Reid then aged 5, would become Wells future wife.
Wells was 14 when the family migrated to Australia. In 1891, five years later, after a furious row with his father Wells packed his bags and departed for England. Andrew had demanded his son put his creative talents into the business but Wells was determined to become a professional artist, he refused and left.
On his own, without family blessing and very little money, Wells enrolled in the Slade School of Art in London. To pay school fees and living expenses he took work painting scenery in London theatres.
Wells next moved to Paris to study at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. He fell under the influence of the Barbizon School - part of a wider European movement of unromantic naturalistic landscape painting.
Wells returns to Glasgow
With a firm grounding in draftsmanship and perspective from the Slade, composition, and naturalism from France, and overflowing with youthful confidence, he returned to Glasgow in 1895 determined to make a go of it.
In a blow to his pride, his early paintings did not sell. Biographical articles of Wells suggest there ‘followed a period of introspection and mood that bordered on despair’.
To make matters worse his growing affection for his young cousin Helen exploded into another bitter row with his father who opposed any engagement.
In the Spring of 1897, as soon as Helen reached 21, in what sounds like an elopement they leave Glasgow and get married in Preston. Without prospects as an artist Wells is forced to accept a position as a scenery painter, work he considers drudgery.
Believed to be Helen Gordon Wells: From the collection of Yvonne Wells.
The life of a scenery painter was hard, the constant need for fresh scenery of a high standard at short notice was exhausting. Over time they built up enough modest savings to take a six-month holiday in ‘Pastoral solitude’ – at Sunderland Point.
Sunderland Point
We believe he knew of the Point through Philip T. Gilchrist who had strong family links with the village. How he met Gilchrist, 17 years his senior – also a landscape painter of considerable merit – is unknown, perhaps through the wide circles of Lancashire painters.
Initially staying in rooms at Point Farm (number 14) in later years he lived in the farm cottage next door (number 13). Philip would come to occupy the upper floor of Point Farm. As well as being friends and living next door, they both had studios created in the ‘Large House’ on Second Terrace (Behind where the Reading Room now is) and both exhibited together.
Local history records that in the great flood of 1907, the weight of water broke down the door of number 13 and washed away many of his paintings, ‘some were found in the meadow, one across the river and two on Heysham skeer’.
Number 13 (right) where Wells lived and number 14 next door where Philip Gilchrist made his home in the upstairs half in 1908. As they are today: Photo Author.
Wells is inspired by what he sees. Supported by artistic friendship he begins a series of paintings which eventually makes him famous.
The Studio in September 1910 wrote ‘Temperamentally Wells is nervous and can concentrate only in rural solitude or among the simple fisherfolk in his favourite Lancashire hamlet by the Lune’.
Landscape with White House c 1900(?): Courtesy of the Harris Museum & Art Gallery Preston.
This is the side of number 3a, painted from the garden of number 3. In this technically skilful painting, the woman dressed for effect in black and white is Helen, Wells wife. He uses her as the primary female figure in all his paintings.
In 1904 he exhibits three paintings including ‘Glasson Dock’ at the Royal Academy in London, and further paintings in 1905, 1907 and 1908. In 1906, both Wells and Philip Gilchrist are admitted to the Royal Society of British Artists.
Below is the ‘Pilot’s Lass’ (Apologies, we could not find a coloured version) a much-admired painting on first showing, Helen is full face and wistful standing on the West Shore. The sea pinks are in full bloom and boats on Morecambe Bay are just visible in the distance.
Pilot’s Lass: From the Studio magazine 1910.
Taking almost the same pose – notice the slight movement in the ribbons of Helen’s bonnet suggesting a light breeze - Wells uses it again to brilliant effect in ‘A summer Afternoon’.
A Summer Afternoon c.1907: Courtesy of Paisley Museum and Art Galleries.
Wells takes considerable artistic license here. The location seems to be on the opposite bank of the river looking towards the Point. The sails of boats in middle distance suggest the river and give depth to the picture, Second Terrace is visible in the far distance. But where is First Terrace?
This is the same grassy banks of the West Shore – the lines of the gullies are identical - he cleverly fits pieces of topography together to achieve an idealised landscape.
A landscape c1906: In a private collection.
In this roughly painted sketch in oils, school children are seen walking home over the tidal road. (An experience well remembered by many of a certain age) It’s the expression of an idea – one that comes to fruition in one of his major works of the period ‘Home across the Sand’.
Home across the sand 1907: Courtesy of Gallery Oldham.
This is a cleverly thought-out study; the very low horizon emphasises distance and the brooding overcast weather creates drama. The children’s clothing in whites and darks is eye-catching and centrally placed, so while we follow the perspective into the distance, we always return to the road and the children.
Importantly, Wells does not miss seeing the gruelling and backbreaking work of digging and collecting mussels from the shore by the wives of the fishermen.
He develops the idea in a series of paintings.
Gathering Mussels c 1907: In a private collection
This observant and naturalistic picture illustrates the hard work of picking and bagging mussels.
In this next painting, a vibrant and heavily brushed sketch in oils, we see just two women, notice the one right, bending, is barefoot.
A grey day at the beach: In a private collection
Wells takes the idea a step further, instead of looking outwards towards the river and distant hills, he turns the image to face the buildings, and again one woman standing the other stooping.
Mussel Picking, a watercolour circa 1908: In a private collection.
This is becoming familiar. The background is now Second Terrace, Wells must have been satisfied with the pose of the women (the woman on the right is now clearly Helen).
Lastly, the women stay almost exactly as they are, but Wells changes the background - moving to First Terrace - he wants a dramatic sky as a backdrop to his figures. The result, ‘The Mussel Gatherers of Sunderland Point’ is one of his best and most famous works.
The Mussel Gatherers of Sunderland Point c1908: Courtesy of Fleetwood Museum.
These two are from Second Terrace. Wells gives the ‘Cotton Tree’ centre stage in this initial picture.
Title and date unknown: In a private collection. This copy courtesy the Gilchrist family.
The tree is large and looms heavily and threadbare, an idea continued in the poles and loosely hanging nets.
In this last SP image known as ‘Drying the Nets’. We see Helen with basket and salmon fishing nets drying out on the posts. The mood is quite different. It’s sunny and confident, the black of fish house (a store for netting) gives contrast.
Drying the nets c1908: In a private collection
Wells in the Isle of Man
In the census of 1911, he is living at Ballavear Colby, Rushen, a small village up in the hills overlooking Castletown Bay, on the southern tip of the Isle of Man. Wells is 39 and records himself as a painter/artist. Helen is 35 and they have two sons Andrew Milton, now age 12 and at school and the new-born William Archibald.
At some point the family move around the coast to a house on Finch Road, on the outskirts of Douglas; perhaps to be nearer to views the Port and sea.
In the ten years 10 years living on the Isle of Man Wells reaches full artistic maturity. Of the many paintings we chose this one, it’s Wells at his very best and most personal. It’s called ‘A Manx Landscape’ and was painted in the summer of 1912. It’s a field near the artist’s home which he called ‘My Chillyvyn’ (Manx for The Wells). The figures in the foreground are Helen now freed from her Lancashire bonnet and their youngest son William, known as ‘Bennie’. The basket is for a picnic.
A Manx Landscape 1912: Courtesy of Glasgow Museums Resource Centre
Wells in Devon
In 1919, for the last four years of his life, Wells moved his family to Devon.
In census of 1921 they are living at 12 Ferry Rd in Topsham – a very beautiful small town – close to Exeter. Wells is now 49 and Helen 46. Their eldest son Andrew Milton has left home, he served in the Indian army in the First World War and spent time in India and France. Their second son William Archibald Wells is 10 and at school.
We could choose from many wonderful paintings, but this one – we could not resist. It’s the harbour at Appledore, Devon.
The ‘Two Sisters’ and the ‘Francis Beddoe’ c1921: Courtesy of Dundee Art Galleries and Museums
The family have just one last move, to Appledore on the northern shore of Devon overlooking Bideford Bay. It is here that Wells dies on the 4th of May 1923. The death certificate gives the cause of death as mainly bronchitis. Poignantly, the certificate notes he suffered for 17 days before finally passing away and that his brother Archibald was with him when he died.
In the Isle of Man Times obituary (May 1923), a close friend of Wells wrote.
‘He was a man of singularly gentle and refined character retiring to a degree and wholly free from the envy and uncharitableness that is sometimes laid to the charge of the artistic temperament. He never dressed up like an itinerant photographer’.
We give grateful thanks to the Glasgow museums resource centre, Museum Oldham, City Museum Edinburgh, Stephen Sartin, Beth Hampson, the Gilchrist family and Yvonne Wells for their help in the preparation of this article.
To read Stephen Sartin’s article on ‘The Mussel Gatherers of Sunderland Point’ click here
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