William GEAR (Scotland, b. 1915, d. 1997)

 March Landscape 1952

Oil on canvas

Purchased through the Easterfield Bequest in 1952

Bill Gear paintings have been part of my life as long as I can remember.  My parents lived in the same village as the Gears and in return for helping them out of the perennial hardship of being the family of an artist, Bill gave them several paintings which are still hanging on the walls of my parents house.

It was soup that led my father and I to March Landscape.  My Dad, now 84, had just arrived from England on a short visit.  It was late February.  We were in Nelson at lunchtime.  Where can you get soup in summertime?  Well nowhere apparently or at least none within walking distance for an elderly man.  So we tried The Suter Café.   No soup but over a light lunch of salads and beer my ignorance of Nelson history was quickly exposed.  “How did The Suter gets its name?”  asked by Dad.  In search for an answer, leafing through the excellent publication The Suter: One Hundred Years in Nelson we recognised the unmistakable outline of a Gear painting.  The conjunction of straight and slightly off parallel lines with angular dashes of colour was instantly identifiable.  For my father having travelled from well-loved Bill Gear paintings to find another 12,000 miles away, and as we later discovered, the only one in New Zealand or Australia, was nothing short of astonishing

Mark Evans

Nelson