Literature: -Urban Images, Catalogue of the exhibition held in Chichester, 2-23 July 1995, reproduced on the title page, catalogue number 33

Exhibition History: -London, Royal Academy, Summer Exhibition, 1943, number 599
Chichester Art Festival, The Bishop's Palace, Urban Images, 2-23 July 1995, number 33, illustrated on the title page

Leslie Wilson presents us with a striking birds-eye vision of the newly built Battersea Power Station towering triumphant over wartime London and juxtaposed somewhat surreally with a cascade of white lilies.

Completed in 1939 after a gruelling ten-year long construction project, this iconic art deco vision is still the largest brick building in Europe and was the first coal-fired electrical generating facility set up in England. Until the completion of Battersea, electricity was supplied through small companies with stations for each industry or group of factories. Its supply to general public was sold separately and was heavily unpredictable and not to be relied on. The London Power Company recognised this and set out to build very large stations and sell the power to anyone who wanted it, the first of which was Battersea. Fears regarding the scale of the project and those who were worried about the possibility of pollution sparked protests. Therefore the company hired Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, a noted architect and industrial designer, famous for the design of the red telephone box, of Liverpool Anglican Cathedral and of another London power station, Bankside, which now houses the Tate Modern art gallery. The resulting design is a steel-framed building with brickwork hung from the outside, similar to the skyscrapers being built in America at the time. It was spectacular and transformed people's lives allowing them comforts beyond their imagination.

Leslie Wilson's wartime paintings all carry strong moral, political and religious messages. He was overtly anti-war and the metropolis we look down upon beyond the station, right over to Chelsea represents a city striving to re-emerge amidst the horrific bomb damage, especially around the Southbank. The lilies, surreally suspended in the foreground refer to the passage from the Bible which is hand carved into the frame. This reads ' Your father knows you have need of all these things': a fragment from a sermon from Matthew which begins 'consider the lilies of the fields' which preaches faith in God to take care of our needs - to give us comfort cloth us and feed us. This verse seems particularly poignant amidst the growing expectations of luxuries at home and needs of people as technology advanced and electricity became more accessible.

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