LONDON.- Two images of New York by the British artist Christopher Nevinson feature in Bonhams next Prints and Multiples Sale in London on 9 December. The mezzotint, New York Night (43rd Street) is estimated at £25,000-35,000 and the drypoint, Three A.M. A Corner by Madison Square at Night at £10,000 - 15,000.

In 1919, Nevinson, who had built a reputation on the strength of his defining images of World War I, was invited to exhibit in New York by the American print dealer and publisher Frederick Keppel. Keppel asked him back the following year and the result of these New York visits was a series of striking images depicting a cityscape dominated by buildings that tower over the inhabitants. Although American artists had already tapped into this idea, Nevinson was the first British artist to respond to a city in this way.

Three A.M. A Corner by Madison Square at Night conjures up images of Fritz Langs’s 1927 masterpiece Metropolis and Nevinson was later to claim an influence on both the set design and the film poster.

Bonhams Director of Prints and Multiples, Rupert Worrall, said, “Nevinson was anxious to get away from Europe after the horrors of the First World War and to move on artistically. His wartime experiences were not so easy to escape, however, as the stark angularity and suppressed menace of his New York series show.”

Nevison soon wearied of New York mainly because of the lukewarm reception for his 1920 exhibition. Back in Europe he spent a productive time in France and a number of images from this period also feature in the sale. A French Port (Bordeaux) – £20,000-30,000 is a complex and atmospheric depiction of the city and Quartier Latin (£3,000-4,000) and Pont Royale (£4,000-6,000) attest to his long term affection for the French capital. All these works were executed in 1922.

The earliest of the seven prints in the sale is set in the United Kingdom. Southwark (Limehouse), executed in 1918, is a rare mezzotint from the end of the war. Estimated at £20,000-30,000, the image shows two watermen on the river dwarfed by dark and brooding wharf buildings in a part of London barely changed since Dickens set Our Mutual Friend there in the mid 1860s.