Poperro. Oil on canvas.

Original oil on canvas 410x365mm. The paint applied thickly with no varnish, a few spots of loss, abrasion to edges, on the original artist made stretcher. FREDERICK ROBERTS JOHNSON 1900-1986.Frederick Roberts Johnson (Fred) rarely used his own name to sign his work. Occcasionally he used his initials, ‘FRJ’ but due to his admiration for the American Essex automobile, adopted the pseudonym ‘Essex’ or ‘Sax’. During the late 1920s and 1930s he became a very successful illustrator, creating cartoons, caricatures and other ‘funnies’ for such publications as Punch, Everyman and Time and Tide – the latter being a weekly left-wing literary review magazine.In 1924 he and his great friend, the artist Arthur Wragg, visited Polperro for the first time and fell in love with the place. Frederick Thomas Nettleinghame, a publisher and ‘tourist operator’ had arrived in Polperro the year before, setting up a business dealing in artefacts for the tourist market. He found the two young artists to be enthusiastic assistants in the production of burnt wood designs, or ‘pokerwork’. Subsequently Fred Roberts Johnson and Wragg rented a cottage in the village each summer. This continued throughout the 1930s, during which time they became integral members of the Polperro community. In addition, Fred acquired an old stone net loft in the village, for use as a studio. His friendship over the years with the local fishermen resulted in the creation of a group of fisherman’s portraits, which were hung in the Polperro Museum.…