Looking down Clink Street from Southwark Cathedral

Born and raised in Lancashire, Noel Spencer studied at the Royal College of Art during the 1920s. In a career spanning almost forty years, Spencer taught in Birmingham, Sheffield and Huddersfield. He was Head of Norwich School of Art for nearly twenty years, where his memory has been honoured with the annual Noel Spencer Award for Painting.

Noel Spencer 'dedicated his life to recording' and in this painting he documents the narrow streets of riverside Southwark at a time when the area was ceasing to be an area of working wharves and warehouses. One of several views of this part of London by the artist, this image focuses on two buildings linked by four walkways. Just beyond the lowest walkway, a solitary man can be seen standing on the street.

During the 1960s, when this painting was made, Spencer was teaching at Norwich School of Art. Many of his sketches and studies of London were made from his student days until about 1957, and this work is said to have derived from a pencil sketch of the same site, made in 1946.

This is one of five tempera paintings which the artist gave to the Museum in 1981.