LS Lowry: the emerging artist and how he priced his paintings

Today I came across an unusual image in amongst a lot of image files I was transferring from one device to another. It's a list of priced oil paintings by Laurence S. Lowry - or LS Lowry as he became better known in later life.

The titles say a lot about life in Salford at the time

List of priced paintings exhibited by LS Lowry in 1921
at the Office of Rowland Thomasson at 87 Moselt Street, Manchester

On the Lowry website, there's a timeline of Lowry's life - so took a look and apparently back in 1921 he exhibited his paintings for the first time. 

In 1921 Lowry exhibited work alongside two other artists in an architect’s offices in Manchester. The exhibition was reviewed in the Manchester Guardian by Bernard Taylor who described Lowry as someone who ‘may make a real contribution to art.’

So I looked up "Office of Rowland Thomasson" and got this archive page about the architectural practice on the Manchester Victorian Architects website.

This states

In 1921 the artist L S Lowry, with two others exhibited in the offices of Rowland Thomasson at 87 Mosley Street Manchester. Here Lowry sold his first picture, a pastel, entitled "The Lodging House,"

So the first painting Lowry sold was a pastel - which he sold for 10 guineas.

That's the equivalent of just over £500 in today's money after allowing for inflation.

This was right at the beginning of Lowry developing his theme of painting the urban landscape seen on his travels as a rent collector.

Within a decade of that first sale his work was being collected by Manchester Art Gallery and
Salford Museum & Art Gallery.

Litographs of his work now sell for the low thousands. His oil paintings typically sell for in excess of £100k.

While the most most expensive sale of a Lowry work was The Football Match which sold for £5.6 million back in 2011. Lowry was a big City fan and had a bit of a fixation about painting on the theme of football matches!

The Football Match by Laurence Stephen Lowry 1949 (Private Collection). pic.twitter.com/MMAdUPXClz

— Dr Liv Gibbs (@DrLivGibbs) May 27, 2017

The moral of the story? 

Paint what you know. Paint what you like and enjoy

Then think long and hard about how you price your paintings as you're starting out as an artist. It's probably more important to make a sale than to price too high and  make absolutely nothing.

It's also worth thinking long and hard about the price that attracts impulse sales....