Night

Thomas Cantrell Dugdale 1880 - 1952

Summary

A crowded bar scene. People are sitting at the tables in the foreground, engrossed in conversation, with bottles of wine and siphons on their white tablecloths. An elderly waiter leans over one table with a tray of drinks. A crowded dance floor behind him is filled with young, dancing couples. At the very rear there are musicians seemingly elevated on a stage. The walls behind are covered in posters and slogans. The room is lit by a few lamps along the very top of the back wall. In a letter to the Gallery dated 20 February 1927, the artist wrote "In reply to your question as to subject, I regard it as a comment on a certain sort of night dance club. Though it represents no one club in particular. The idea came in the first place from 'Le Jockey', a students and artists resort in Montparnasse, and is a sort of compound of that and two or three similar ones in London. To me it is typical of the present time in that white people spend nights dancing in packed crowds to music supplied by blacks. The types are real, and include several artists and well-known frequenters of similar places - many of whom actually sat for me. For obvious reasons I do not officially give you their names. I made a lot of 'back of envelope' notes on the spot in various places, and reconstructed in the studio". The tall man with the red neckerchief has since been identified as deaf artist Alfred R Thomson. Both Thomson and Dugdale were members of the Chelsea Arts Club in London. Thomas Dugdale trained at Manchester School of Art and the Royal College of Art before studying in Paris where the bars and clubs were a great source of inspiration to him.