Famous British artist, L.S. Lowry, pictured in front of one of his paintings in 1961.
Laurence Stephen Lowry was born in November 1887, but he didn’t achieve significant recognition until his first solo show in London in 1939. Though he initially divided critics, by the time of his death in 1976, he was widely recognised as one of the most important artists of his generation, and his fame has only continued to grow since then.
Lowry’s popularity is reflected in the prices his work fetches at auction; his most expensive painting was sold for £6.6 million in October 2022, and his prints (which account for 70% of his work sold at auction) regularly reach prices between £1,000 and £5,000.
Lowry was a private, reclusive, and somewhat peculiar man, but his personal life had an unarguable influence on the work he produced, and so it is interesting to know some facts about him when considering his work. Therefore, below are seven things you might not have known about L.S. Lowry.
Free Specialist Print Valuations
Please use the form below to submit images of your print and receive a free, no-obligation valuation from a specialist auctioneer. We will also actively seek the highest offer from our network of private collectors to help you sell your print.
"*" indicates required fields
He Had A Difficult Childhood
Though L.S. Lowry grew up in a fairly comfortable, middle-class home, his childhood was not a happy one. His parents did not encourage his interest in drawing, they showed little affection towards him, and he did not have an easy time at school.
Lowry’s relationship with his parents was not made easier once he became an adult; his father died in 1932, leaving significant debts, and his mother subsequently took to her bed and became dependent on her son to care for her. From then until her death in 1939, Lowry painted during the night and early hours of the morning after his mother had fallen asleep, and many of his work from this time suggest he was extremely unhappy and lonely. This sense of loneliness is a common feature in much of Lowry’s work, including in pieces created after he’d achieved recognition for his talents, such as ‘Group of People’ and A Street Full of People.
His Most Expensive Print Sold For £34,000
Going to the Match currently holds the record as Lowry’s most expensive painting sold at auction, and the prints he produced based on this painting are equally popular; they account for 18 out of the artist’s 20 most expensive prints sold at auction, with one particular print having reached £34,000 when it was sold by Bonhams in June 2023.
Going to the Match sold by Bonhams in 2023
He Only Used Five Colours
Lowry famously claimed that he almost always used just five colours (Prussian blue, yellow ochre, flake white, ivory black, and vermillion), explaining, “I am a simple man, and I use simple materials”. This limited colour palette is very effective at capturing the drabness and the bleakness of the industrial landscapes Lowry is best known for, yet the artist also created a number of monochrome prints, including The Pavilion, Tree in a Square, and Castle on the Sands. One monochrome lithograph, A Street Full Of People, features unique additional hand-colouring in blue crayon, making it highly sought after; it was sold by Christie’s in March 2020 for £17,000.
He Was A Rent Collector
Because Lowry only achieved fame later on in his life, he had to support himself by working a normal day job until he retired in 1952, aged 65. He tended to keep quiet about his day job, fearing it might mean he was not taken seriously as an artist, but he could not conceal it altogether, and he was sometimes labelled as a so-called “Sunday painter”. His retort was: “I’m a Sunday painter who paints every day of the week.”
He Loved Football
Lowry’s most popular print, Going to the Match, depicts a sea of football fans converging on Burnden Park, which, at the time, was the home ground of the Bolton Wanderers, and was in fact only a few miles away from Pendlebury, where Lowry lived for several decades. Football is indeed a major theme in much of Lowry’s work; the artist himself was a lifelong Manchester City supporter, and he was interested in the sense of purpose and community created by the game.
L.S. Lowry – At the Seaside
And He Loved The Sea
Although Lowry is best-known for his depictions of industrial life, he also produced numerous seascapes throughout his career. The artist once stated: “I’ve always been fond of the sea. How wonderful it is, yet also how terrible. I often think… what if it suddenly changed its mind and didn’t turn the tide – and came straight on?”
Despite living around Greater Manchester almost all his life, Lowry nurtured this love of the sea by taking regular trips to places such as Sunderland and Berwick-upon-Tweed. Coastal landscapes and scenes appear in much of his work, including The Pavilion and Castle on the Sands, both of which sold for over £9,000.
A Missed Train Played A Vital Role In His Career
Famously, L.S. Lowry attributed the industrial themes of his work to one unique moment in his life: missing a train. After the Lowry family moved from a leafy suburb of south Manchester to the industrial town of Pendlebury, the artist said that at first he “detested it”, but then became “obsessed by it.” This obsession with the industrial landscape was strengthened when he once missed a train, and as he left the station, he saw workers streaming out of the Acme Spinning Company’s mill. In his own words, “I watched this scene – which I’d looked at many times without seeing – with rapture.”
