Mary Godwin (artist)

Mary Godwin (1887–1960) was a British oil painter, water colourist and etcher, who often chose landscapes, interiors, and figures as subjects.

She studied at the Women’s Department of King’s College with John Byam Shaw, and at Westminster Technical Institute with Walter Sickert and Harold Gilman.

From 1908 to 1910 Mary Godwin studied in London with John Byam Shaw, who taught at The Women’s Department of King’s College.

[1] Mary Godwin is first listed as exhibiting at the New English Art Club (NEAC) and the London Salon of the Allied Artists Association (AAA) in 1913.

[1] Harold Gilman died in 1919, after only a short time at the Westminster School of Art, but by then he had inspired a loyal group of followers, including Mary Godwin, Ruth Doggett, and Marjorie Sherlock, who carried on with his approach into the 1920s and 1930s.

The Connoisseur reviewed the third exhibition of the London Group in 1916 and concluded that it contained "several paintings and drawings which came within the category of art, and many others which could only be regarded as pieces of foolishness."

[13] "Much the same comment [perfectly intelligible paintings coarsely executed in exaggerated colours] might [sic] Miss Mary Godwin's Bedroom and Fish.

This artist, if she got rid of her mannerisms, would be capable of good work, for her draughtsmanship, though expressed with wilful slovenliness, is well informed, and the Fish revealed a feeling for colour which even its crude handling did not wholly conceal.

[7] The Times reviewer noted the influences of Walter Sickert and Charles Ginner, but credited Godwin with "her own taste in colour".

[1] The Apollo reviewer also compared her work approvingly to that of Charles Ginner, noting an "unconscious affinity" in their use of colour and choice of subject.