Joan Nicholson Portrait by Jehan Daly

Yesterday evening a small miracle happened .... I was in the garden attempting to pull up weeds as a break from the computer toil of the day, and ... the land line rang. I never use my land line and am always a little suspicious of it when it rings as everyone I know rings me on my mobile these days.

The message was faint but enough to make me curious to call the number back. The number I called was answered by a lovely gentleman, who back in the 1980s had bought a painting at a country house sale. The painting was by Jehan Daly of a Mrs Roger Nicholson, my mother. He found my number from the Royal Society of Portrait Painters. He was on a mission to find out who the woman in the portrait was, and I was so excited to see it ... he sent it to me in an email shortly after our conversation. Here it is (above), and it is quite lovely. Jehen Daly was a great family friend of my parents from after the war and he with John Ward and Gordon Davies painted together on various projects and my mother also sat for them. This portrait, though I have never seen it before, is so familiar as I have many sketches of that same pose in my collection, by both Jehan and my father, also oil paintings of her likewise. I know that chair ... it is an old friend ... he was also my sister's godfather and a sweet and gentle man. I have a photo taken by my father of him holding a tabby kitten, black and white, he in ubiquitous tweeds, very of the time ... I am just now rummaging around in the garage to find the old photos so I can scan it in to send to Bill the owner of the painting. I also have an oil painting of Jehan at his easel by my father. 

Then I was ferreting around online to see what there was on Jehan Daly and there is not a great deal but  found this site and went on to type in Roger Nicholson and found this beautiful painting (below) which again I do not remember at all, but would dearly love to know where it is now. I would love it as it is of a period of my father's painting that I particularly love. He was SO good at colour ... exciting, riveting colour ... I remember thinking as a child that the colours he used were entirely a new breed of unknown colour, nothing like the colours I was learning at school ....

It just kept me thinking of these personal things out in the world I have no idea of the places they have settled or the journeys they have undergone to get there, as my father did not exhibit much, only painting for pleasure he was and is relatively unknown. I would love to have the time to bring them both into the public eye but I have so little time. Anyone out there who would love to do this as a labour of love? Any information about paintings by Roger would be gratefully received ... nancy@nancynicholson.co.uk

Now back to the cobwebs and dead mice in the garage!

Later .... found them! so lovely to find so many and smile through these lovely but very stinky old photos and so many slides! Anyway here is Jehan, my mother and father, all taken around that the time of the portrait. Also the others mentioned ...

Jehan Daly with one of John Wards children I think it may be in Folkestone
where the Wards had a flat.

Jehan Daly

Roger Nicholson

Joan Nicholson with same kitten and my sister Naomi

This is the painting my father Roger did of my mother at the same sitting ...

Jehan Day by Roger Nicholson