EDWARD SEAGO was one of England’s most popular and prolific artists of the 20th century, with subject matter ranging from circuses and ballet to landscapes, hunting scenes, war-torn Italy, the coronation of Elizabeth II and the icebergs of Antarctica. The queues in Bond Street outside his dealer, Colnaghi’s, on the mornings of the opening of his annual exhibitions were legendary and, inevitably, such popularity drew the sneers of the cognoscenti, who tended to equate facility with shallowness. An unfair judgement, as evidenced by the Portland Gallery’s current exhibition of his work to mark the 50th anniversary of his death.
Ted Seago was born on March 31, 1910, in Norwich, the second son of Brian Seago, area manager of a firm of coal merchants, and his wife, Mabel. Norwich had a long tradition as an artistic centre, ranging from the 19th-century Norwich School of Cotman, Stark and Crome to Alfred Munnings, Arnesby Brown and Bertram Priestman. The latter was to encourage and tutor young, recalled the artist describing how he would paint Norfolk scenes when in Sardinia, Italy, where Seago had a holiday home, and views of Venice in Norfolk. Coping with these bouts of illness made Seago a stoic, forcing him to regard their all-too-regular occurrence as ‘ordinary events’ and thus strengthening his determination to live life to the full.
