Peasant Fare

Frederick Brown was born and brought up in Chelmsford and this painting is the first example of his work acquired by the museum. It depicts two working women near a window in a dark interior, an older one preparing vegetables and a younger apparently wiping dishes. It dates from early in Brown’s career when his work was most innovatory and influential. The use of the newly developed square brush with its characteristic stroke was typical of young anti-Academic, French-influenced artists, who grouped only a few years later into the New English Art Club and also the ‘Newlyn school’. This painting shows their type of unsentimental social interest often showing working-class life