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Bradford and Visions of Childhood

What was wonderful about childhood is that anything in it was a wonder. It was not merely a world full of miracles; it was a miraculous world.

- G.K. Chesterton Autobiography 1936

Richard grew up with his sisters and brother in the Manningham area of north Bradford, home to a number of German and other professional families. They lived near Lister Park, with the magnificent Cartwright Hall Art Gallery & Museum at its centre. He remembered with extraordinary clarity the scents, sights and daily rituals of this Edwardian childhood in his memoir, and Lister Park is at the heart of his recollections. There, he observed the weekly performances of bands, the crowds in their Sunday best. He was fascinated in particular by the huge processions associated with May Day and Whitsuntide …which seemed to bring something oriental to dull, smoky Bradford.

Childhood Visions

These early memories began to surface in the late 1940s and form a group of very different works, to the occasional bafflement of his London gallery and the art press. Simultaneously real and dreamlike, they are peopled with characters and scenes from Richard’s Bradford who seem to watch and observe each other. They have been described as an antidote to the concentrated period of war paintings and commissions, his involvement with his own young family and perhaps by recollections stirred when writing his memoir.

Processions and Gatherings

Alongside vivid descriptions of gigantic processions on certain days of the year, he also remembered…a strange rite called the Whitsuntide walk. The walkers in singlets and shorts all looked bony, wiry little men…. There was usually a clown, possibly with a collecting box, running ahead and causing much mirth by his droll wit and capers.

The Mummers (1952)
© Estate of Richard Eurich, Bridgeman Images, 2022
The Mummers (1952)
A sailor-suited Richard stands enthralled by the troupe below. Once common across Yorkshire, these ancient plays of winter’s decay and spring renewal were performed on Old Year’s Night, when Mummers went from house to house. Here they are the unconventional Beldon family, their costumes echoing the strange circus figures of Whitsuntide walks and processions.
The Guy (1948)
© Richard Eurich Paintings
The Guy (1948)
In the first of two works of the same title, and one of many night scenes, a tangle of figures dance joyfully around a huge guy, his crackling bonfire set against a high wall of industrial brick. A strip of deep blue sky, pierced by a glittering rocket emphasizes the feeling of looking down on a stage, as does the archway revealing the busy street beyond. Click on title above to view another version of "The Guy" done ten years later.
Paper Boats (1951)
© Christopher Cone
Paper Boats (1951)
"In the evening thought quite suddenly of another vision of childhood picture, sailing fireboats (paper) down a tunnel. Bradford Beck perhaps. Boys watching them and gasworks etc coming up over the top of the coping..." Constrained by culverts, what was known locally as ‘Mucky Beck’ eventually flows out of the city, the tunnel creating a dramatic setting against the clusters of chimneys, terraces and hills.
Gay Lane (1952)
© / Bradford District Museums and Galleries
Gay Lane (1952)
"Gay Lane (Ilkley) used to figure in Police News a good deal but I transferred it to something more like Bradford." In this Breughel-like scene, Richard recalls a time of lamplighters and sweeps, costermongers and horse-drawn cabs; where children still play out on narrow streets paved with stone setts.
Robin Hood's Bay (1935)
© Beaverbrook Art Gallery
Robin Hood's Bay (1935)
The shabby cottages and workaday clothes of the residents–some wearing the familiar Staithes bonnets- place this as a prewar portrait of the popular fishing village. Amongst an assortment of drawn-up cobles, a mast at the harbour’s edge holds the attention of the silent crowd, waiting for the catch.
The Messenger (1962)
© Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation
The Messenger (1962)
This strange, imagined panorama was inspired by the Messenger passage within Franz Kafka’s short story, "The Great Wall of China". Sketchy impressions of crowds from different times and places gather or wander around the partially built towers and dry-stone walls of what is clearly a vast, rocky northern landscape.
The Procession, Yorkshire (1970)
© / Bradford District Museums and Galleries
The Procession, Yorkshire (1970)
Many of the elements so vividly described by Richard are present. On a drab day, the jaunty crowd spread across the centre-ground almost merges with the walls, hills and distant pit-village. This closely toned prospect is lifted by the pearly reservoir in the centre and echoed in the white costumes of a few revellers.
Northern Procession (1983)
© Richard Eurich Paintings
Northern Procession (1983)
Richard began to paint more loosely and in a higher key from the mid 1970s, though he would return to his smoother, detailed style when needed. Northern Procession refers back to Whitsuntide memories, but like "The Messenger" the figures are roughly realised, taking on the warm reds and oranges of the buildings they process through.
The Epiphany (1973)
© Arthur Tooth and Sons
The Epiphany (1973)
Silhouetted against a snowy North Yorkshire landscape at dusk, an intimate group of figures pause and bear witness. They are illuminated by a single lantern and the glow of warm light from a source beyond the picture.
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