William McCance, an anti war activist Scottish painter

After being imprisoned for conscientious objection during WW1, William McCance still refused to conform.  McCance rejected the more conventional art which flourished in Scotland in the 1920’s like Cecile Walton. Instead, influenced by the Cubist elements wafting over the Channel, he began a series of paintings which reflected his anti-war stance. This painting at the Kelvingrove Gallery, Glasgow, from 1922 called ‘Conflict’ offers aggressive shapes which appear to be almost Guernica-derived.  An outlier in the largely Art Deco decorative environment, he turned to book design and teaching in London and Wales. He had a small touring retrospective in the UK in the 70s but has largely been lost to history.