E.Q. Nicholson

The Grange in Rottingdean, previously home of artists William Nicholson and Mabel Pryde and their four children, is continuing a series of revelatory exhibitions this summer with one about little known artist and designer Elsie Queen – always known as EQ – who married Ben’s brother Kit (Christopher) the successful Modernist architect and designer. The exhibition concentrates on the decade during and just after the war when the young John Craxton, a family friend, tubercular and exempt from war service, spent time living with EQ and her children at the Mill House, Alderholt, in East Dorset. It was here that EQ embarked on over a decade of exciting experimental paintings and drawings using what her daughter Louisa calls ‘dazzling, fitful colours’ in gouache, collage and crayon and whatever wartime rationing allowed to come to hand. These revealed her delight in the colours and patterns of domestic utensils, plants in the garden and the landscape she was immersed in.

Read The Charismatic Queakle by Carolyn Trant from ROSA Magazine Summer 2026

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