Famous L. S. Lowry painting depicting a rugby league crowd to go on public display for first time ahead of auction

[Total Rugby League]

The earliest known sports painting by L. S. Lowry, depicting crowds gathering for a rugby league match is to be unveiled in public for the...

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[thunder pete]

The BBC had it as a "rugby match"

[north yorks trinity]

They do refer to it as rugby league even though the headline simply says rugby. I've no problem with the term "rugby" as it's the term I most usually use when referring to rugby league, and rugby league is what I think of as rugby. It actually irritates me that "rugby" is usually automatically assumed to be union and I'm happy for it to be used for either as long as it is then easy to tell which code is being discussed, as it is with this article:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-56945241

[Wiltshire Warrior Dragon]

Good story; thanks to TRL for the original post.  All I need now is £2m to £3m to buy it!

I agree with NYT that there is nothing wrong in just saying 'rugby' in the headline.  I quite like the idea of using just 'rugby' when I mean rugby league.  I once got a letter published in The Times in which I managed to get the great French fullback, Puig Aubert, simply described as a French 'rugby international'; I felt smug!

On a thoroughly pedantic note, the TRL article notes that the evidence in the picture suggests this is a crowd heading to a Salford Red Devils' game.  Chronologically, I don't think that is right.  Didn't they earn their nickname - initially "Les Diables Rouges" - when on tour in the south of France a few years after Lowry painted this picture?  But I admit, thoroughly pedantic...sorry!

[Rowan]

Isn't it our own fault NYT for dropping the word when he launched our generically titled elite division? Below that we have championship and league one - no mention anywhere of who we are.  If we had to have Super League we could surely have called the second tear Rugby League Championship (and demanded the Championship trophy be returned to the League by Wigan) 

[JohnM]

Great story.

The 1928 work shows crowds heading to a rugby league match, possibly depicting fans of Lowry's local team Salford Red Devils.

Not sure about the BBC text, above. SWINTON was his local team,I think.

[RBKnight]

I believe the PFA bought the football equivalent, on permanent loan to the Lowry Gallery in Manchester, which depicts scenes outside Burnden Park in Bolton.

Are the RFL going to have a whip-round ? 

 

[graveyard johnny]

5 minutes ago, RBKnight said:

I believe the PFA bought the football equivalent, on permanent loan to the Lowry Gallery in Manchester, which depicts scenes outside Burnden Park in Bolton.

Are the RFL going to have a whip-round ? 

 

russel crowe could buy it and give us some publicity- loose change to him 

[White Chevron on Blue]

Lowry lived at 117 Station Road Pendlebury for 40 years (1908 to 1948 ), less than 100 yards from Swinton's ground. However it says the painting was made in 1928 a year before Swinton's Station Road ground was opened. Swinton's previous ground was on Chorley Road. Two wooden stands from the Chorley Road ground were taken down and reassembled at the Station Road ground (information courtesy of Stephen Wild's excellent book "The Lions of Swinton   https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/lowry-house-pendlebury-plaque-statute-16349056

Swinton won all 4 cups in 1927 and clearly Lowry would have witnessed hunched and disconsolate away supporters leaving the Chorley Road and Station Road grounds . This clearly inspired Lowry to paint his figures in the style he became famous for. A percentage of the proceeds of this auction and all future Lowry sales should therefore be donated into a fund to build a new stadium in Swinton for the Lions.!!!

[yipyee]

RFL should buy this, be a better asset than Odsal..

[JohnM]

2 hours ago, White Chevron on Blue said:

Lowry lived at 117 Station Road Pendlebury for 40 years (1908 to 1948 ), less than 100 yards from Swinton's ground. However it says the painting was made in 1928 a year before Swinton's Station Road ground was opened. Swinton's previous ground was on Chorley Road. Two wooden stands from the Chorley Road ground were taken down and reassembled at the Station Road ground (information courtesy of Stephen Wild's excellent book "The Lions of Swinton   https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/lowry-house-pendlebury-plaque-statute-16349056

Swinton won all 4 cups in 1927 and clearly Lowry would have witnessed hunched and disconsolate away supporters leaving the Chorley Road and Station Road grounds . This clearly inspired Lowry to paint his figures in the style he became famous for. A percentage of the proceeds of this auction and all future Lowry sales should therefore be donated into a fund to build a new stadium in Swinton for the Lions.!!!

Swinton won all 4 cups in 1927 

I know. I was there! 

[Rupert Prince]

3 hours ago, graveyard johnny said:

russel crowe could buy it and give us some publicity- loose change to him 

He should buy Leigh, it would be appropriate.

Meantime I will have to go and look in the loft.

[JonM]

Presumably the red scarves being worn by the fans are why it's being assumed to be Salford.

[Rupert Prince]

Are there 2 different "going to the match" paintings?   Because I have looked on the internet and as well as the one being auctioned, there are prints for sale of a different one!

[JonM]

1 hour ago, Rupert Prince said:

Are there 2 different "going to the match" paintings?   Because I have looked on the internet and as well as the one being auctioned, there are prints for sale of a different one!

Yes. The more famous one is from 1953, and shows Burnden Park. Lowry was a Man City fan and painted a number of scenes with football fans. There's one called 'Coming from the Match' showing Rochdale Hornets fans leaving the ground.

[JohnM]

Still rugby related, so here goes.     I was dragged up from birth within a stone's throw of the playing fields that were created where the Lion's Chorley Road ground used to be. Part of that was built on for housing and the rest now seem to be taken up by St Mary's primary school, formerly located on Swinton Hall Road at the top of our avenue near Victoria Park.   The Evans's were somewhat of a local Swinton dynasty when "I were a lad"  and if my memory serves  which it probably doesn't), I may have met Bryn Evans in the late 1950s at some social event or other. I and my mates played many an ad-hoc game with scratch teams on Pendlebury Road playing field across the road from the Station Road ground, again in the late 1950s early 1960s.  Many's the time we looked like Lowry characters after yet another Lions defeat at Station Road ( before the two divisions triumphs).

OK, OK, The nurse is taking me back to my room now..........

[Wiltshire Warrior Dragon]

40 minutes ago, JohnM said:

Still rugby related, so here goes.     I was dragged up from birth within a stone's throw of the playing fields that were created where the Lion's Chorley Road ground used to be. Part of that was built on for housing and the rest now seem to be taken up by St Mary's primary school, formerly located on Swinton Hall Road at the top of our avenue near Victoria Park.   The Evans's were somewhat of a local Swinton dynasty when "I were a lad"  and if my memory serves  which it probably doesn't), I may have met Bryn Evans in the late 1950s at some social event or other. I and my mates played many an ad-hoc game with scratch teams on Pendlebury Road playing field across the road from the Station Road ground, again in the late 1950s early 1960s.  Many's the time we looked like Lowry characters after yet another Lions defeat at Station Road ( before the two divisions triumphs).

OK, OK, The nurse is taking me back to my room now..........

I would have thought you are being a bit harsh on the Lions of that era, JohnM.

I recall my dad, not much of a sports fan, coming home from a Saturday night drink at the pub on the East Lancs Road where the Leigh to Salford main road crossed it (Queen's Head, perhaps?  I forget) and the Swinton team had come in for a celebratory drink after lifting the league title.  I think that would have been at the end of the 1963-64 season.

In the spring of '65, I went to see my team, Wigan, take on Swinton at Knowsley Road in the cup semi-final.  Wigan won 25-10, as I recall, with Trevor Lake cutting in off the wing for a quite brilliant try which left the fleet footed Ken Gowers trailing in his wake.  I remember thinking that was an exceptional victory, given how strong Swinton were then.

[JohnM]

Not trying to come over as harsh on the Lions of that era. Really talking of 1957 for a few seasons  well be for the 1960s high point.   Looking back over 60 years!  

[Davo5]

Maybe Wakefield could sell off their collection of Stadium paintings.

[Wholly Trinity]

9 hours ago, Davo5 said:

Maybe Wakefield could sell off their collection of Stadium paintings.

Unfortunately, they don't hold the copyright as they didn't produce them.