Figure (Woman)
- Artist: Magda Cordell
- Date: 1956–7
- Medium: Oil paint on hardboard
- Dimensions: support: 2312 x 1522 mm
- Museum: Tate Britain
- Collection record: Tate Britain website
Listen to the free audio guide
About this artwork
This is the “Figure (Woman)” by Magda Cordell. Painted in 1956–57, it’s a bold oil on hardboard that still feels fresh and immediate. Cordell was working in the same restless post‑war London scene that saw the rise of the Independent Group, and critics at the time read the thick, splashed layers as a visual echo of the era’s nuclear anxieties. They saw a woman whose body is stretched, distorted, almost torn apart by the brush, suggesting both danger and survival.
Fast forward a few decades and the same distortions are re‑read as heroic femininity. The rough, textured surface isn’t just a crash of paint; it’s a testament to resilience. Cordell’s work sits beside Art Brut figures like Dubuffet’s “Tree of Fluids,” showing how raw, unfiltered energy can coexist with figurative intention.
Presented by the artist in 1996, the piece remains a striking reminder that the figure can be both a mirror of fear and a celebration of strength. Its size, its thick impasto, its unapologetic form—all keep viewers asking: what happens when the body becomes a battlefield and a sanctuary at once?
See it in person
Figure (Woman) is in the collection of Tate Britain on Millbank, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
