Charles Sims, R.A., R.W.S. (British, 1873-1928), The Land of Nod

Oil on canvas (lined), 1906, signed at lower right, an exhibition label from the American Art Association / Anderson Galleries, Inc. is affixed to the stretcher, presented in a House of Heydenryk frame with gallery plaque.

Stretcher size 40 x 50 in.; Frame dimensions 51 x 61 1/2 in.

Private Collection, Edenton, North Carolina

Royal Academy, The One Hundred and Thirty-Eighth (Summer Exhibition), London, 1906
Mrs. Hearts, New York (acquired from the above)
Sotheby's New York, Important 19th Century European Paintings, October 29, 1981, Lot 85

Exhibited:
London, Leicester Galleries, 1906
London, The Exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts, The One Hundred and Thirty-Eighth (Summer Exhibition), 1906, no. 77

Charles Sims was an English painter whose career bridged Edwardian elegance and the shifting modernist sensibilities of the early 20th century. Trained at the Royal Academy Schools in London and later in Paris, Sims first gained recognition for his idyllic, dreamlike scenes of figures in luminous landscapes, works that conveyed a sense of innocence and poetic beauty. His reputation grew rapidly, and he became a Royal Academician in 1915, eventually serving briefly as Keeper of the Royal Academy Schools. The First World War, however, deeply affected him, and his later works took on darker, more symbolic and expressionistic qualities, often exploring spiritual struggle and the human condition. His career ended tragically with his suicide in 1928, but Sims remains remembered for both his shimmering pastoral visions and his uncompromising, emotional later canvases that foreshadowed modernist tendencies in British art.

This painting, The Land of Nod is one of his most lyrical and imaginative works, portraying children drifting into the dream world of sleep. Bathed in soft, glowing light, the figures appear weightless, carried into a realm of innocence and wonder that reflects Sims’s gift for blending fantasy with painterly delicacy. Painted during the shadow of the First World War, the work also resonates as an escapist vision, offering a tender contrast to the harsh realities of its time.

In 1917, the London Underground and Charles Sims reproduced this painting as part of a series of morale posters for troops stationed in France during WWI. The image was accompanied the Robert Louis Stevenson's poem, "The Land of Nod," from A Child's Garden of Verses, first published in 1885.

Allover stable craquelure with associated retouch; recently conserved with full conservation report available.