Catalogue essay by Richard Shillitoe

Four separate forces combined to give birth to Dreaming Leaps. These were: the suicide of a 23-year-old woman, the establishment’s censorious response, surrealism’s celebration of personal freedom, and one man’s attempt to revitalise the moribund London surrealist group.

On 3rd September 1945, twenty-three-year-old Sonia Araquistain jumped naked to her death from the roof of her home at Arthur Court Mansions in Bayswater, where she had been living with her father. She was a painter, had been educated for a period at Summerhill, the experimental school founded by A. S. Neill and in 1938 she had provided illustrations for The Last Man Alive, a children’s story written by Neill.

At the inquest it was disclosed that she was fascinated with dreams, had “dabbled” in psychoanalysis and had read Freud. The deputy coroner, whose remarks were widely quoted in the local and national press, described these interests as “not a suitable or desirable subject for all, or any, people” and hoped that her death would act as a deterrent to
others.

Georges Henein, a poet and prominent figure in the Egyptian avant-garde, had co-founded the surrealist group Art et Liberté in Cairo in 1938 and maintained contacts with European and British surrealists. Henein discussed this repressive reaction with Toni del Renzio, writing that “this suicide gave rise, according to abject English custom, to a trial against the deceased, where the public prosecutor found an unhoped-for opportunity to spit on all that remains of poetry in this world.” Del Renzio had known Sonia slightly. The circumstances behind this acquaintance are unclear, but it was possibly through his own and her father’s involvement in Spanish Republicanism: Louis Araquistain Quevedo had once been the Republic’s ambassador in France.

By the time of Araquistain’s death, all group activity by the London Surrealist Group had ceased, and Mesens’ heart was no longer in his leadership struggle with del Renzio. Toni himself was worn out by his efforts to instil some life into the group but following the approach of Henein, he attempted to trigger some joint activity to reenergize the group. Thinking back to the example of Violette Nozière, the eighteen-year-old French girl whose murder of her father had inspired the Paris surrealists to make a collective response, del Renzio saw the opportunity to do something similar. He hoped to publish a volume of artistic and poetic responses to Sonia’s act. His own response he summarised in these terms: “for me, the image of this girl who mounts the stairs nude before her final leap lent a lucidity to the works of Delvaux.” However, the only artist to respond to his initiative was his wife Ithell and the only writer to do so was Georges Heinen.

Much later, in 2016, the Canadian writer, David Bosc used the tragedy as the inspiration for his text Mourir et puis sauter de son cheval.

Exhibited:
London, Mayor Gallery, 1947, 5 – 29 March. Exhibition of Paintings by Ithell Colquhoun. no.
8; Bradford, Cartwright Hall, 1949. 25 March – ? Spring Exhibition. A catalogue is not known, but Dreaming Leaps has been identified from newspaper reviews; Cambridge, Heffer Gallery, 1953, 20 April – 9 May. Ithell Colquhoun. Paintings and Drawings 1942-1953. no. 8.; Penzance, Newlyn Gallery, 1961, 2 – 27 October. Ithell Colquhoun: Retrospective Exhibition of Oil Paintings. no. 6; Exeter, City Art Gallery, 1972, Museum and Art Gallery. 26 Sept.– 21 October. Ithell
Colquhoun: Paintings, Collages and Drawings. no. 6.; Penzance, Newlyn Gallery, 1976, 27 Feb. – 23 March. Ithell Colquhoun: Surrealism, Paintings, Drawings, Collages 1936-76. no. 16; Canterbury, The Herbert Read Gallery, 1986, 19 – 31 May. Surrealism in England 1936, exhibition later travelled to Cardiff and Newcastle. no. 87, as ca. 1946; Leeds, City Art Gallery, 1986, 10 Oct. – 7 December. Angels of Anarchy and Machines for Making Clouds. Surrealism in Britain in the Thirties. no. 29, ill. col. Tate St. Ives, Ithell Colquhoun, Between Worlds, 1 February – 5th May, 2025.

Literature:
Colquhoun, 1981, Women in Art. Oxford Art Journal, 4 (1) p. 65. (A letter responding to an article by Dawn Ades); Schwartz, A. 1989. I Surrealist. Milan: Mazzotta. ill. col. p. 464; Remy, 1999, Surrealism in Britain. Aldershot: Ashgate. ill. col. pl. 140, discussed pp. 240-1; Ratcliffe, 2007, Ithell Colquhoun. Oxford: Mandrake. ill. col. pl. 44. Tate St. Ives, Ithell Colquhoun, Between Worlds (2025).