John Piper: The Forties

Artist: John Piper 
Author: David Fraser Jenkins 
Publisher: IWM 
Date: 2000
Condition: A generally clean and little-read copy of this catalogue, a little delamination of the cover at the bottom edges and a strip of sunning along the spine

This catalogue, published to accompany the wonderful 2000-2001 Imperial War Museum exhibition of the same title, focusses on a decade where Piper was perhaps at his most influential. In the 1940s Piper was one of Britain’s best known artists and his rendering, particularly of architectural subjects, in his signature style melding modernist abstraction with an eye for details, is very captivating.

From the paintings of Coventry Cathedral after the 1940 raid to the images of the country houses of Britain in the post-war years, this was the period that cemented Piper's identification in the public mind with the very fabric of the nation. A great read and filled with fabulous but often little-known paintings. 

A useful, interesting and now quite scarce catalogue.