D Brucciani Co (1837 - 1951)

D Brucciani & Co

D. BRUCCIANI & CO
(19th Century)

St Cecilia

Polychrome painted plaster bust with mould lines visible (with later painting)

47 cm., 18 ½ in. high

This cast was made in second half of the19th century from a terracotta bust in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum. The bust represents a female saint, sometimes called St Cecilia. The Victoria & Albert bust was initially ascribed to Donatello but it has now been revealed that the bust is a “pasticcio”, where a head, modelled in the mid 19th century, has been fitted upon a damaged bust, probably dating from around the second half of the 15th century.


Domenicho (Domenico) Brucciani (1815-1880) was born in Lucca, Italy and migrated to England in the first half of the nineteenth century. He established a business which produced casts of sculptural works from international collections. By 1837 he owned a showroom near Covent Garden and was selling works to the British Museum and the South Kensington Museum (now the Victoria and Albert Museum). By 1857 D. Brucciani & Co. were working for the British Museum, making moulds and casts of their classical sculptures, bronzes and other pieces, to be sold commercially.


The company was successful during Brucciani's lifetime as it capitalised on the nineteenth century fashion to have plaster casts of sculptural works in the home. Following his death his business was purchased by another Italian, Joseph Caproni (1846 - 1900), who retained the name D. Brucciani & Co., and the business continued to manufacture casts, with customers including the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Museum of Classical Archaeology.


However, as demand for plaster casts declined in the twentieth century, the business failed. Consequently, it was purchased by the V&A and operated as the Department for the Sale of Casts until 1951 when it was forced to closed due to financial losses.


St Cecilia - plaster cast by Brucciani & Co

George Elgar Hicks (1824 - 1914)

George Elgar Hicks

30 by 25 cm., 11 by 9 in. (frame size 50 by 41 cm., 19 by 16 in.) 

Hicks was born in Lymington, Hampshire, the son of wealthy magistrate. Initially intended for the medical profession he studied at University College from 1840 to 1842. In 1843 he abandoned is medical training in favour of art and enrolled in Sass’s Academy and in 1844 entered the Royal Academy Schools. 

Portrait of a Young Gentleman dates to the early part of Hicks’ career when he was involved in his young and growing family and painting portraits of his friends and family. In the following years he exhibited the first of his large and acclaimed genre paintings of crowded modern life scenes that were to make him famous: 

Portrait of a Young Man by George Elgar Hicks

John Everett Millais (1829 - 1896)

John Everett Millais

SIR JOHN EVERETT MILLAIS, BT, PRA
(1829-1896)

Effie

Signed l.r.: Millais
Pencil
Framed

30.5 by 13.5 cm., 12 by 5 ¼ in.
(frame size 30 by 47 cm., 11 ¾ by 18 ½ in.)

Provenance:
Private collection, UK.

Executed c.1853, this portrait is closely related to the smaller Portrait of Effie Ruskin now in the collection of the National Gallery of Canada. Effie is shown wearing a similar lowcut gown with braided hair piece and a dark ribbon at her neck.

In July 1853 Millais became close to Effie Ruskin during their long visit to Scotland to paint Millais’ famous portrait of Ruskin. The five-year Ruskin marriage had been difficult with Ruskin largely ignoring his wife. During their long stay in the small cottage at Brig o’Turk, Effie and Millais had fallen in love. On their return to London the Ruskin marriage was over, to be annulled in 1854 on the ground of “incurable impotency”. Effie and Millais were married in 1855 and they were to have eight children together.


Portrait of Effie by John Everett Millais

Frederic James Shields (1833 - 1911)

Frederic James Shields

FREDERIC JAMES SHIELDS, ARWS
(1833-1911)

Ellen

Signed and indistinctly inscribed with the name of the sitter on the reverse
Chalks

37 by 28.5 cm., 14 ½ by 11 ¼ in.
(frame size 63.5 by 54.5 cm., 25 by 21 ½ in.)

Provenance:
The Artist’s estate;
Private collection.

Shields was born in Hartlepool and brought up in extreme poverty with most of his family succumbing to TB. Employed by a commercial engraver he studied at evening classes in London and then in Manchester, where he settled in 1848. 

He was greatly impressed by the works of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, which he saw at the Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition in 1857. The quality of his illustrations for Defoe’s History of the Plague (1862) and Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress (1864) brought him to the attention of Ruskin and Rossetti, who invited him to visit him in London. He became a close friend of Rossetti and Madox Brown and settled in London in 1876 and Rossetti offered him space in his own studio and helped and encouraged him with his work. A close friend of the whole Rossetti family, he was commissioned by Rossetti’s mother to design two windows in memory of her son in All Saints’ Church, Birchington. He was also asked to make a drawing of Rossetti on his death bed. Shields painted mainly in watercolour and exhibited at the Society of Painters in Water Colours, becoming an ARWS in 1865. He was also a fine illustrator, mural decorator and stained glass designer.


Head of a Greek Model by Frederic James Shields

British School (1800 - 1899)

British School

Oil over a photographic base, on card and mounted onto original canvas 

58.5 by 46 cm., 23 by 18 in. (frame size 80 by 67.5 cm., 31 by 26 in.) 

Paintings over a photographic base started to become popular in the latter part of the 19th century with some photographers and artists advertising themselves as artist-photographers. The photographer provided the prepared enlargement which was then painted over in oils by the artist. By the 1860s colour photographic enlargements could be produced. These were pasted on canvas, mounted on an artist’s stretcher, painted, varnished and, as in the present work, presented in an elaborate frame. Later it became possible to photo-sensitize the canvas surface upon which the portrait could be projected and fixed. Such portraits were normally of middle-class sitters and it is unusual to find such a splendid example of a rustic figure wearing his traditional smock.

A Warwickshire Farmer - Victorian Oil over a Photographic base

Albert Toft (1862 - 1949)

A sculptor of the New Sculpture movement, Toft first trained at Wedgwood and attended art schools in Hanley and Newcastle upon Tyne. He won a scholarship to study modelling under Lanteri at the South Kensington Schools in 1881-3. He was a successful portrait sculptor who also produced decorative and architectural sculpture. He was elected to the Art Workers Guild and in 1938 was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors.

Albert Toft

 Indistinctly signed l.r.: Albert Toft  Bronze, dark brown patina, on wooden base

 Diameter 24.5 cm., 9 ¾ in.  (base diameter 28 cm., 11 in.)

This is the larger of Tofts two portrait medallions of the famous actor Sir Henry Irving. This plaque was originally sculpted in 1887 and re-cast in 1904, on the death of Irving, by the Alfred Barnard Foundry. Not bearing the foundry mark, this appears to be a later cast. A very similar version was recently sold in the Fine Art Society sale at Sotheby’s, 5 February 2019, lot 86.

 A sculptor of the New Sculpture movement, Toft first trained at Wedgwood and attended art schools in Hanley and Newcastle upon Tyne. He won a scholarship to study modelling under Lanteri at the South Kensington Schools in 1881-3. He was a successful portrait sculptor who also produced decorative and architectural sculpture. He was elected to the Art Workers Guild and in 1938 was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors.

Bronze Relief Portrait of Sir Henry Irving by Albert Toft

Frank Lewis Emanuel (1865 - 1948)

United Kingdom Frank L. Emanuel, deeply occupied with art, worked as painter, illustrator, printer and art critic. He studied in London at the Slade School under Legros and later at the Academie Julian in Paris. He exhibited from 1881 at the Royal Academy in London and in the Salons of Paris. He traveled widely in Europe, South Africa and Ceylon. He staged watercolour exhibitions and published articles on topographical subjects in the Architectural Review and Manchester Guardian, and Illustrations de Montmartre. He taught etching at the Central School between 1918 and 1930 and one of his paintings can be found in the Tate Gallery.

Frank Lewis Emanuel

Signed, inscribed and dated l.l.: A S HARTRICK (artist) by F L EMANUEL 1884 Black chalk heightened with white chalk on blue paper 

(frame size 55 by 44.5 cm., 21 by 17 in.) 

Emanuel was born and lived in London where he studied at the Slade under Alphonse Legros before further studies at the Academie Julian, Paris. From the late 1880s he began to show at the Royal Academy and Paris Salon, also exhibiting at the New English Art Club and elsewhere. He travelled widely in Europe, Africa and Ceylon. He became chief examiner for the Royal Drawing Society and published a number of books on etching and general art criticism. He is represented in the collection of the Tate Gallery, London. 

The sitter is Archibald Standish Hartrick, RWS, OBE (1864-1950) who was a fellow Slade student with Emanuel. They also both studied at the Julian in Paris and this portrait dates to this time. During his stay in France he became friends with Gauguin, van Gough and Toulouse-Lautrec. Returning to the UK he worked as an illustrator and taught drawing at Camberwell School of Art and worked as a watercolour artist exhibiting in London and elsewhere. During World War I he contributed the British War Memorials Committee collection and during World War II he contributed to the Recording Britain Scheme.

Portrait of Archibald Hartrick by Frank Lewis Emanuel

Edward Arthur Walton (1860 - 1922)

Edward Arthur Walton

EDWARD ARTHUR WALTON, RSA, PRSW
(1860-1922)




Oil and watercolour on linen laid on board




The Artist’s son, Professor John Walton;
Alberto Morrocco;
His studio sale, Christie’s, London, 11 July 2012, lot 124;
Neil Wilson.




Edinburgh, Bourne Fine Art, The Painted Lady, 1850-1930, July 1982, no.6.



F MacSporran, Edward Arthur Walton, Glasgow, 1987, illus. pl.37, p.50.

Edward Arthur Walton was born in Barrhead, Renfrewshire into an artistic family, his father being a competent amateur painter and photographer and three of his siblings taking up artistic pursuits. He studied at the Kunstakademie in Dusseldorf and the Glasgow School of Art. Living in Glasgow he became a close friend of Joseph Crawhall, whose sister had married Walton’s brother. Crawhall introduced him to George Henry and James Guthrie. Together, they and a group of other like-minded artists in that region, became known as the Glasgow Boys. Most had a Continental training and were developing Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painting into their own distinctive style. They were united in their passion for realism and naturalism and were influenced by the works of Jules Bastien-Lepage and James Abbott McNeill Whistler. Walton in particular was a huge admirer of Whistler and in 1884 he was a leading member of a group who petitioned Glasgow Corporation to buy Whistler’s Portrait of Thomas Carlyle. It was the first work by the master to be acquired by any public body worldwide.

Walton lived in London between 1894 and 1904, living in Cheyne Walk in Chelsea, and was a neighbour of Whistler and John Lavery. Painted during his time in London, the present work is a study for Portrait of Miss Jane Aitken (private collection). In its posed long and strong profile with limited background and tones it clearly shows the influence of Whistler. The final portrait was highly regarded and was exhibited at the 

Glasgow Institute of Fine Arts in February 1894, no.279; Paris, Exposition Nationale des Beaux Arts, 1896, no.1235; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, 1896-1897; Berlin, Eduard Schulte Gallery, 1900; Liverpool, Autumn Exhibition, 1901, no.387

. The convex mirror in this study was left out of the finished portrait and the decorative motifs on the backdrop were also omitted.


Portrait of Miss Jane Aitken by Edward Arthur Walton

Alfred Drury (1856 - 1944)

Born in Islington, London, Drury was raised in Oxford where his father owned and inn.  He attended Oxford School of Art and then the National Art Training School, South Kensington (1877-1881) where he was taught by F W Moody and then by the French sculptor Jules Dalou.  Between 1881-5 Drury worked in Paris with Dalou and on his return to London he worked briefly as an assistant to Sir Edgar Boehm.  He was a key artist of the New Sculpture movement and during his long career he completed many architectural groups and figure pieces.  His major commissions for architectural and monumental works including groups for Leeds City Square, the front of the Victoria and Albert Museum, Vauxhall Bridge and the War Office Building, Whitehall.

Alfred Drury

ALFRED DRURY, RA
(1856-1944)

The Age of Innocence

Signed: A DRURY
Bronze on green marble base

Height including base 45.5 cm., 18 in.

Born in Islington, London, Drury was raised in Oxford where his father owned and inn. He attended Oxford School of Art and then the National Art Training School, South Kensington (1877-1881) where he was taught by F W Moody and then by the French sculptor Jules Dalou. Between 1881-5 Drury worked in Paris with Dalou and on his return to London he worked briefly as an assistant to Sir Edgar Boehm. He was a key artist of the New Sculpture movement and during his long career he completed many architectural groups and figure pieces. His major commissions for architectural and monumental works including groups for Leeds City Square, the front of the Victoria and Albert Museum, Vauxhall Bridge and the War Office Building, Whitehall.

This a version of Drury’s 1897 marble bust exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1897 (now in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London). It was so successful that Drury made a number of versions in bronze, some being full size of head and shoulders with other reduced version of the head only.

The sitter was Grace Doncaster, the daughter of a friend of the artist.


Alfred Drury bronze - The Age of Innocence

Arthur Hacker (1858 - 1919)

England Arthur Hacker was accomplished in a spectrum of different styles and genres that were distinctively his own. Hacker studied at the Royal Academy Schools from 1876 and in Paris from 1880-81 under the portrait painter Leon Bonnat. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1878 and his 1892 exhibit, The Annunciation, was bought for the Nation under the terms of the Chantrey Bequest. He was a founding member of the New English Art Club.

Alongside his late allegorical subjects, he produced atmospheric London street scenes such as A Wet Night at Piccadilly Circus, which was chosen for Hacker’s diploma work for the Royal Academy upon his election to a full member in 1910. He also produced genre paintings inspired by the rural realism of Jean-Francois Millet. Furthermore, throughout his life, Hacker was in demand as a portrait painter of glamorous society women, dignified gentlemen, and fellow artists.

Arthur Hacker

ARTHUR HACKER, RA
(1858-1919)

Portrait of Dora Radcliffe

Signed and dated u.l.: To Dora Radcliffe/ from Arthur Hacker/ Aug ‘92
Oil on canvas
Framed

56 by 43 cm., 22 by 17 in.
(frame size 74 by 61.5 cm., 29 by 24 ¼ in.)

Arthur Hacker was the son of Edward Hacker, a London based engraver. He studied at the Royal Academy Schools between 1867-80 and at the Atelier of Leon Bonnat in Paris, where one of his fellow students was Stanhope Forbes. After Paris he travelled in Spain and North Africa with fellow artist Solomon J Solomon and would return to revisit these areas on many future sketching expeditions. His diverse subject matter includes still lifes; romantic, religious and figure subjects; portraits and landscapes. He first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1878, being elected an Academician in 1910. He was also a regular exhibitor at the New Gallery and became a founding member of the New English Art Club in 1886. Works by him are in the collections of the Tate Gallery, London; Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool; Leeds City Art Gallery and many other public and private collections.


Arthur Hacker - Portrait of Dora Radcliffe

Herbert Johnson Harvey (1883 - 1956)

Herbert Johnson Harvey

HERBERT JOHNSON HARVEY
(British 1883-1956)

Reverie

Signed with monogram and dated l.l.: HJ 09
Red chalks
Framed

29.5 by 22 cm., 11 ¾ by 8 ¾ in.
(frame size 56 by 45.5 cm., 22 by 18 in.)

Herbert Johnson Harvey was a landscape and portrait painter, print maker and metal worker. He was born in Hammersmith, London but his family moved to Birmingham when he was about 4 years old. His father, John Rabone Harvey, was also an artist a member of the Royal Society of Birmingham artists. He moved to London in 1911 and in the late 1920s spent some time in Italy. His work was exhibited at the Royal Academy and elsewhere in the UK.


Herbert Johnson Harvey - Reverie

ALFRED DRURY, RA
(1856-1944)

Griselda

Signed: A DRURY
Bronze, on green marble base

27 cm., 10 ½ in. high

Born in Islington, London, Drury was raised in Oxford where his father owned and inn. He attended Oxford School of Art and then the National Art Training School, South Kensington (1877-1881) where he was taught by F W Moody and then by the French sculptor Jules Dalou. Between 1881-5 Drury worked in Paris with Dalou and on his return to London he worked briefly as an assistant to Sir Edgar Boehm. He was a key artist of the New Sculpture movement and during his long career he completed many architectural groups and figure pieces. His major commissions for architectural and monumental works including groups for Leeds City Square, the front of the Victoria and Albert Museum, Vauxhall Bridge and the War Office Building, Whitehall.

Griselda is the heroine of the Decameron (1358), a story of faithful love by the Italian author Boccaccio. A poor country girl, she was chosen by the Marquis of Aluzzo to be his wife, but in order to try her patience he set her various tests and trials, removing her children and sending her back to her father’s cottage for many years before finally reinstating her. The costume and the way the bust is cut straight across are all indebted to Renaissance sculpture. Drury’s large version of Griselda was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1896 (no.1836) and is now in the collection of the Tate Gallery, London. Drury made three different versions of Griselda.


Griselda - bronze by Alfred Drury RA

John Da Costa (1867 - 1931)

John Da Costa

(frame size 80 by 69 cm., 31 ½ by 27 ¼ in.)

John da Costa was born in Teignmouth, Devon and brought up in the Channel Islands. He went to school in Millbrook, Hampshire before going on to study art in Paris and London. After a time in Newlyn he established himself in London as a society portraitist, making several trips to New York to paint his affluent American sitters.

Lillie, the Artist's Wife by John da Costa

Edmund Van Someren (1875 - 1963)

Edmund Van Someren


Signed l.r.: E L van Someren; signed, inscribed and dated on the reverse: “Le Ruban Noir”/ E L van Someren 1903
Oil on canvas
Framed



61 by 51 cm., 24 by 20 in.
(frame size 76.5 by 66 cm., 30 by 26 in.)



Edmund Lawrence van Someren was born in Bangalore, the son of Col Gotlieb James van Someren of the British Indian Army. He was educated at Linton House School, Worthing before studying art at the Dresden Academy and later at the Royal Academy, London, where he won Silver Medals and the Landseer Scholarship. At the outbreak of the Boer War he was commissioned into the Lancashire Fusiliers and served in South Africa. Following the war he remained in South Africa for a time where he established a school of painting in Cape Town. He returned to England in 1906 to live in Chelsea. A portrait and landscape painter, he became a regular exhibitor at the 

Royal Academy, New Gallery, Royal Institute of Oil Painters, Royal Society of Portrait Painters 

and elsewhere. In 1927 he moved to Melton House, Woodbridge where he lived for the rest of his life.


Le Ruban Noir by Edmund van Someren

Jenny Zillhardt

JENNY ZILLHARDT
(French 1857-1939)

Portrait of Jocelyn Antrobus, Aged 18

Signed and dated 1893
Pencil and coloured chalks on buff paper
Framed

43.5 by 30 cm., 17 ¼ by 12 in.
(frame size 68.5 by 51 cm., 27 by 20 in.)

Provenance:
By descent in the family of the sitter.

The sitter, Jocelyn James Antrobus (1876-1953), was the son of Crawford John Antrobus of Eaton Hall, Cheshire. He was educated at Charterhouse and New College, Oxford. He was ordained in 1901, first becoming curate of Hatfield 1904-13, then vicar of Saffron Walden, 1913-17; rector of Hatfield, 1917-36. He wrote Hatfield: Some Memories of Bishop’s Hatfield and its Past in 1912.

Marguerite Valentine Jenny Zillhardt was born at Saint-Quentin in Aisne. She and her sister Madeleine studied under Tony Robert-Fleury at the Academie Julian from 1877. At the time it was the only institute of art education open to women in Paris. Their fellow students included Louise Catherine Breslau and Marie Bashkirtseff. She first exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1878 and remained a regular exhibitor. She was part of the French female group of artists represented at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. She received the Legion of Honor in 1930.

Works by her are in the collection of the Musee d’Orsay, and the museums at Langres and Saint-Quentin and elsewhere.


Portrait Of Jocelyn James Antrobus, Aged 18 by Jenny Zillhardt

Frederick James Halnon (1881 - 1958)

Frederick James Halnon

Bronze with green patination on marble base

Halnon was born in London and studied at the Goldsmith’s Institute from the early age of 11 where he was a pupil of Alfred Drury, a leading exponent of the New Sculpture Movement. There he won two national gold medals in 1902-3. He went on to become modelling master at Goldsmiths’ College. In 1906 he joined the Royal British Society of Sculptors, thanks to the sponsorship of Alfred Drury, his second nomination coming from Francis Derwent-Wood. An adherent of the New Sculpture movement, he was particularly influenced by the work of Frederic, Lord Leighton. He exhibited a portrait plaque of Leighton in the 1906 Royal Academy. In 1923 Halnon became an Associate member of the Royal British Society of Sculptors, and a Fellow in 1938. 

A Bacchante - Bronze by Frederick James Halnon

William Henry Barribal (1873 - 1956)

William Henry Barribal

WILLIAM HENRY BARRIBAL
(1873-1956)

Girl in a Green Hat

Signed
Watercolour and bodycolour and silver paint
Framed

19 by 19 cm., 7 ½ by 7 ½ in.
(frame size 38 by 37.5 cm., 15 by 14 ¾ in.)

William Henry Barribal was born in Oswestry, Shropshire and first worked as an apprentice lithographer in London before studying at the Academie Julien in Paris. By the turn of the century he was established as an accomplished artist and designer, painting portraits and working as a very active commercial artist. During the 1920s and 1930s he created a range of posters for Schweppes and the London and North Eastern Railway and playing card designs for Waddington’s. He also works for many magazines including Vogue, Illustrated London News, The Strand and The Graphic. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and elsewhere. His wife, Gertrude Louise Fannie Pitt, was his principal model. Barribal lived in London and worked from one of the well-known St Paul’s studios on the Cromwell Road.


The Green Hat by William Henry Barribal

William Shackleton (1872 - 1933)

William Shackleton was born in Bradford, the son of a paper manufacturer and merchant.  He was educated at Bradford Grammar School and then studied art at Bradford Technical College.  In 1893 he won a scholarship to the National Art Training School (later to become the Royal College of Art), where he gained a British Institute Scholarship in 1896.  This enabled him to study in Paris and Italy.  On returning to London, he took a studio in Chelsea, sharing it with Philip Connard and Oliver Onions.  He would spend many of the summer months West Sussex, joining Edward Stott and his artistic community based around the South Downs village of Amberley.  After 1914 he moved to a cottage close to Gordale Scar, near Malham, in the Yorkshire Dales.  There the dramatic landscape would feature in many of his later paintings.  

Greatly influenced by Turner and George Frederic Watts in his colouring, atmosphere and impressionist handling, Shackleton developed a personal vision of the spirituality of nature which was reflected in his symbolist paintings which often depicted the mysticism of life and destiny via the myths and legends of antiquity.  He described his own work as “conscientious symbolism”.

Shackleton exhibited widely sending being a regular exhibitor at the Royal Academy and many other major venues both in London and regionally.  He also represented Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1910 and again in 1922.  He held solo shows at the Goupil Gallery in 1913 and at the Twenty-One Gallery in 1910 and 1922.  In 1933 a memorial exhibition was held at the Cartwright Hall Art Gallery, Bradford.  Works by him are in many public collections


William Shackleton

WILLIAM SHACKLETON, NEAC
(1872-1933)

The Amethyst Pendant

Signed and dated l.c.: Wm Shackleton ‘24
Watercolour, bodycolour and pencil
Framed

29.5 by 25.5 cm., 11 ½ by 10 in.
(frame size 47.5 by 44.5 cm., 18 ¾ by 17 ½ in.)

Provenance:
The artist’s studio sale.

William Shackleton was born in Bradford, the son of a paper manufacturer and merchant. He was educated at Bradford Grammar School and then studied art at Bradford Technical College. In 1893 he won a scholarship to the National Art Training School (later to become the Royal College of Art), where he gained a British Institute Scholarship in 1896. This enabled him to study in Paris and Italy. On returning to London, he took a studio in Chelsea, sharing it with Philip Connard and Oliver Onions. He would spend many of the summer months West Sussex, joining Edward Stott and his artistic community based around the South Downs village of Amberley. After 1914 he moved to a cottage close to Gordale Scar, near Malham, in the Yorkshire Dales. There the dramatic landscape would feature in many of his later paintings.

Greatly influenced by Turner and George Frederic Watts in his colouring, atmosphere and impressionist handling, Shackleton developed a personal vision of the spirituality of nature which was reflected in his symbolist paintings which often depicted the mysticism of life and destiny via the myths and legends of antiquity. He described his own work as “conscientious symbolism”.

Shackleton exhibited widely sending being a regular exhibitor at the Royal Academy and many other major venues both in London and regionally. He also represented Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1910 and again in 1922. He held solo shows at the Goupil Gallery in 1913 and at the Twenty-One Gallery in 1910 and 1922. In 1933 a memorial exhibition was held at the Cartwright Hall Art Gallery, Bradford. Works by him are in many public collections.


William Shackleton - The Amethyst Pendant

WILLIAM HENRY BARRIBAL
(1873-1956)

Her Best Bonnet

Watercolour and bodycolour over traces of pencil
Framed

23.5 by 18.5 cm., 9 ¼ by 7 ¼ in.
(frame size 42 by 36 cm., 16 ½ by 14 ¼ in.)

William Henry Barribal was born in Oswestry, Shropshire and first worked as an apprentice lithographer in London before studying at the Academie Julien in Paris. By the turn of the century he was established as an accomplished artist and designer, painting portraits and working as a very active commercial artist. During the 1920s and 1930s he created a range of posters for Schweppes and the London and North Eastern Railway and playing card designs for Waddington’s. He also works for many magazines including Vogue, Illustrated London News, The Strand and The Graphic. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and elsewhere. His wife, Gertrude Louise Fannie Pitt, was his principal model. Barribal lived in London and worked from one of the well-known St Paul’s studios on the Cromwell Road.


Her Best Bonnet by William Henry Barribal

Richard Louis Garbe (1876 - 1957)

Richard Louis Garbe

Plaster with patinated surface on a wooden base 

: Gifted by Richard Garbe to his brother Gilbert Garbe and thence by descent. 

Garbe was born in Dalston, London, the son of Gustave Garbe, a manufacturer of ivory and tortoiseshell fancy goods to whom he was apprenticed. He later studied at the Central School of Art and at the Royal Academy Schools. He began exhibiting at the Royal Academy in 1908. He taught sculpture at the Central School 1901-29 and was Professor of Sculpture at the Royal College of Art, 1929-46.

Alfreda, The Artists Daughter by Richard Louis Garbe

Cecil Beaton (1904 - 1980)

England Harrow- and Cambridge-educated Cecil Beaton made his name as a photographer of theatrical, royal and society luminaries. In the thirties, he designed sets and costumes for ballet, opera and films. It was also in this decade Beaton began to photograph the royal family. After the war,he was designing theatre productions, in both London and New York. He famously won Oscars for the flowing elegance of his costume design for Gigi and My Fair Lady. His films were almost invariably set in high society - or in the demi-monde at least. Beaton was chosen as official photographer for many royal events, such as the coronation, and photographing the Queen’s children. He was equally successful in the 1960s, again at the forefront of society and fashion, capturing its beauty. He was made a CBE in 1957 and knighted in 1972.

Cecil Beaton

SIR CECIL BEATON, CBE
(1904-1980)

Anna Pavlova in Autumn Bacchanale - two portrait studies on one sheet

Watercolour heightened with white on buff paper
Framed

39.5 by 26.5 cm., 15 ½ by 10 ½ in.

(frame size 62 by 48 cm., 24 1/2 by 19 in.)

Provenance:
The artist’s studio sale;
Private collection.

Cecil Walter Hardy Beaton was a fashion and portrait photographer, diarist, interior designer and stage and costume designer for the stage and screen. He was born in Hampstead and educated at Harrow and St John’s College, Cambridge although he left without a degree in 1925. He worked as a photographer for fashion magazines and became an extremely popular and well-connected society portraitist who also recorded the gathering of his friends among the Bright Young Things of the 20s and 30s. After the war Beaton started designing stage sets and costumes for London and Broadway. His most lauded achievement for the stage being the costume for Lerner and Loewe’s 1956 production of My Fair Lady.

We are grateful to Andrew Ginger, author of “Cecil Beaton at Home”, for his kind assistance in cataloguing this picture.

Anna Pavlova in Autumn Bacchanale by Cecil Beaton - two studies

John Whitlock Codner (1913 - 2008)

John Whitlock Codner was born in Beaconsfield, the son of the society portrait painter Maurice Codner. He was educated at St Edward’s School, Oxford. During World War II he served in the Royal Artillery, being commissioned into the Royal Engineers in 1940 and serving as a camouflage officer in the Middle East. After the war be studied in London at the Regent Street Polytechnic School of Art. He then taught at the Sir John Cass School of Art, from 1947 to 1951. Following a move to the West Country, he became a member of the Royal West of England Academy. He worked from his studio in Stokenham, Devon and was an honorary member of the Bristol Savages. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and Royal West of England Academy.

John Whitlock Codner

91.5 by 71 cm., 36 by 28 in. (frame size 103.5 by 83 cm., 40 by 32 in.) 

The New Hat by John Witlock Codner

Neville Hickman (1930 - 2012)

Neville Hickman

Signed, inscribed and dated: Holles Monument, St Peter’s Church, Dorchester, 16 April 1958. 

Chalks heightened with white, unframed, in conservation mount 

24.5 by 24 cm., 9 by 9 in. (mount size 42 by 41 cm., 16 by 16 in.) 

The magnificent monument to Denzil Holles, 1st Baron Holles of Ifield stands in the north aisle of St Peter’s Church, Dorchester. When on 2nd March 1629 Sir John Finch, Speaker of the Houses of Parliament, tried to adjourn Parliament at the command of King Charles I, Holles along with Sir Walter Long held the Speaker down in his chair with the instruction that 'he should sit still till it pleased them to rise'. Holles, along with his associates, was tried, convicted and imprisoned in first the Tower of London and then Marshalsea Prison. Holles was released in early 1630. During the Civil War he fought on the Parliamentary side, but later he was critical of Cromwell, and campaigned for the restoration of the monarchy.

Monument to Denzil Holles, Dorchester, Dorset by Neville Hickman

Oliver Messel (1904 - 1978)

Oliver Messel

(Frame size 76.5 by 66.5 in., 30 by 26 cm.) 

Born in London, Messel was the grandson of the illustrator Linley Sambourne. After Eton he studied art at the Slade School of Art and by the early 1930s had established himself as one of Britain”™s principal stage designers. Initially working for the Cochran Revues, he went on to design for many theatrical, operatic, ballet and film productions. His books included Stage Designs and Costumes, 1933; Designs for A Midsummer Night”™s Dream, 1957 and Delightful Food, 1958. He exhibited at the Leicester Galleries and Redfern Gallery and also designed interiors and gardens of the Dorchester Hotel, Flaxley Abbey, Gloucestershire and elsewhere as well as several houses and grounds in Barbados and Mustique. The Victoria & Albert Museum hold the majority of his design archives.

A Dancer - Oliver Messel

Mary Adshead (1904 - 1995)

Mary Adshead

MARY ADSHEAD
(1904-1995)

Portrait of Stephen Bone, the artist’s husband

Pencil and watercolour, squared for transfer
Framed

45 by 32 cm., 17 ¾ by 12 ½ in.
(frame size 62.5 by 48.5 cm., 24 ¾ by 19 in.)

Mary Adshead enrolled at the Slade School of Fine Art in 1921, when she was only 16. There she and Rex Whistler won the joint first prize in the Slade’s Summer painting competition in 1924 and as a result Henry Tonks arranged for them to undertake a joint mural commission at the Highway Boys’ Club in London’s East End. Following this success, she began to receive a steady stream of mural commissions, most importantly those in Liverpool University (1924) and for the British Empire Exhibition (1924) and for Lord Beaverbrook’s dining room (1928) and the Bank Underground Station (1929). She was soon established as a painter, decorator, painter of murals and illustrator, designing posters for London Underground, decorations for the British Pavilion at the 1937 Paris International Exhibition and designed stamps for the General Post Office.

In 1929 Mary Adshead married Stephen Bone, the son of the artist Sir Muirhead Bone. He had studied at the Slade at the same time as Adshead, leaving to become an illustrator and painter. The couple travelled extensively across Britain and Europe where he frequently painted outdoors in all weathers. He was an official war artist during World War II, specialising in Admiralty subjects, a post previously held by his father. He exhibited at the Fine Art Society, Leferve Gallery and Redfern Gallery.

Mary exhibited at the Royal Academy, New English Art Club, Society of Women Artists and Goupil Gallery and exhibitions of her work have been held at The University of Liverpool Art Gallery; Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield and Kingston upon Thames Art Gallery.


Portrait of Stephen Bone, the artist's husband by Mary Adshead

Carolyn Sergeant (1937 - 2018)

Carolyn Sergeant

49.5 by 36 cm., 19 by 14 in. (mount size 65.5 by 51.5 cm., 25 by 20 in.) 

Carolyn Cann studied at Wimbledon School of Art (1955-59) and at the Royal Academy Schools (1959-62) where she was a Silver Medallist. At the Royal Academy Schools she met and later married her fellow student, John Sergeant. She had several one-man exhibitions in London, at the Fine Art Society, Colnaghi, Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox, the Waterhouse Gallery and Waterman Gallery. She also showed at the Leicester Galleries, Roland, Browse and Delbanco and elsewhere. In 1983 John and Carolyn bought an old run down farm house near Builth Wells in Powys, mid Wales. The house needed such extensive renovation that it took many years to complete. After their two sons had grown and left home she was able to devote more of her time to her painting, often specializing in beautifully studied still life studies.

The Chinese Jacket by Carolyn Sergeant

Chalk and grisaille wash over traces of pencil, heightened with white 

53 by 38 cm., 21 by 15 in. (mount size 69 by 53 cm., 27 by 21 in.) 

Carolyn Cann studied at Wimbledon School of Art (1955-59) and at the Royal Academy Schools (1959-62) where she was a Silver Medallist. At the Royal Academy Schools she met and later married her fellow student, John Sergeant. She had several one-man exhibitions in London, at the Fine Art Society, Colnaghi, Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox, the Waterhouse Gallery and Waterman Gallery. She also showed at the Leicester Galleries, Roland, Browse and Delbanco and elsewhere. In 1983 John and Carolyn bought an old run down farmhouse near Builth Wells in Powys, mid Wales. The house needed such extensive renovation that it took many years to complete. After their two sons had grown and left home she was able to devote more of her time to her painting, often specializing in beautifully studied still life studies.

Seated Man in a Pullover by Carolyn Sergeant

45.5 by 32 cm., 18 by 12 in. (mount size 62 by 47 cm., 24 by 18 in.) 

Seated Woman in Profile  by Carolyn Sergeant

John Sergeant (1937 - 2010)

John Sergeant

24.5 by 22.5 cm., 9 by 9 in. (mount size 41 by 38 cm., 16 by 15 in.) 

Sergeant was born in London, the son of a civil servant. His family soon moved to Faversham in Kent after they were bombed during World War II. He studied at Canterbury College of Art from 1954-57, during which period he met John Ward, who was to become a lifelong friend and supporter. In 1959 he entered the Royal Academy Schools, where he won a Drawing Prize in 1961. In 1962 he married a fellow student, Carolyn Cann. After graduating from the RA he taught part-time at art schools in Kent and worked on commissions including book jacket designs and illustrations and series of ”˜room-portraits’ of interiors. He moved to near Builth Wells, Wales in 1983. In 1989 the Prince of Wales asked Sergeant to contribute drawings to his book Vision of Britain; two years later he accompanied the prince on an official visit to Prague. A superb draughtsman, he was a great exponent of the teaching of drawing in art school: “If you can draw you can paint. All you need to know as Whistler used to say, is which end of the brush to put in your mouth”. In his 2006 Colnaghi exhibition he described himself as a “serious serial draughtsman who explores, scrutinizes the same subject back, front, sideways, this way and that. It is all part of trying to understand”. He held one-man exhibitions in London at the Maas Gallery, Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox and Colnaghi.

Portrait of a Young Man by John Sergeant

- Possibly a portrait of the artist’s wife. 

33 by 21.5 cm., 13 by 8 in. (mount size 49.5 by 37 cm., 19 by 14 in.) 

Portrait of a Woman - Probably the Artist's Wife by John Sergeant

JOHN SERGEANT
(1937-2010)

Girl in a Hat

Pencil on pink paper
Framed

24 by 18 cm., 9 ½ by 7 in.
(frame size 46 by 39 cm., 18 by 15 ¼ in.)

Sergeant was born in London, the son of a civil servant. His family soon moved to Faversham in Kent after they were bombed during World War II. He studied at Canterbury College of Art from 1954-57, during which period he met John Ward, who was to become a lifelong friend and supporter. In 1959 he entered the Royal Academy Schools, where he won a Drawing Prize in 1961. In 1962 he married a fellow student, Carolyn Cann. After graduating from the RA he taught part-time at art schools in Kent and worked on commissions including book jacket designs and illustrations and series of ‘room-portraits’ of interiors. He moved to near Builth Wells, Wales in 1983. In 1989 the Prince of Wales asked Sergeant to contribute drawings to his book Vision of Britain; two years later he accompanied the prince on an official visit to Prague.

A superb draughtsman, he was a great exponent of the teaching of drawing in art school: “If you can draw you can paint. All you need to know as Whistler used to say, is which end of the brush to put in your mouth”. In his 2006 Colnaghi exhibition he described himself as a “serious serial draughtsman who explores, scrutinizes the same subject back, front, sideways, this way and that. It is all part of trying to understand”.

He held one-man exhibitions in London at the Maas Gallery, Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox and Colnaghi.


Portrait of a Girl in a Hat by John Sergeant

 Sergeant was born in London, the son of a civil servant. His family soon moved to Faversham in Kent after they were bombed during World War II. He studied at Canterbury College of Art from 1954-57, during which period he met John Ward, who was to become a lifelong friend and supporter. In 1959 he entered the Royal Academy Schools, where he won a Drawing Prize in 1961. In 1962 he married a fellow student, Carolyn Cann. After graduating from the RA he taught part-time at art schools in Kent and worked on commissions including book jacket designs and illustrations and series of ”˜room-portraits’ of interiors. He moved to near Builth Wells, Wales in 1983. In 1989 the Prince of Wales asked Sergeant to contribute drawings to his book Vision of Britain; two years later he accompanied the prince on an official visit to Prague. A superb draughtsman, he was a great exponent of the teaching of drawing in art school: “If you can draw you can paint. All you need to know as Whistler used to say, is which end of the brush to put in your mouth”. In his 2006 Colnaghi exhibition he described himself as a “serious serial draughtsman who explores, scrutinizes the same subject back, front, sideways, this way and that. It is all part of trying to understand”. He held one-man exhibitions in London at the Maas Gallery, Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox and Colnaghi.

Head of a Young Man by John Sergeant

Nicola Hicks

Nicola Hicks studied at the Chelsea School of Art (1978-82) and at the Royal College of Art (1982-85).  She is best known for loosely rendered figurative and animal subjects, often sculpted in straw and plaster and for her lively drawings, often large sheets of brown paper.  She has had major solo shows in leading museums and galleries in Britain and overseas and was made an MBE in the 1995 New Year Honours for her contribution to the visual arts.

NICOLA HICKS, MBE
(Born 1960)

Mrs Samuelson’s Baby Angel

Signed with initials and numbered 1/9
Bronze

30 cm., 11 ¾ in. high

Provenance:
Flowers East, London.

Exhibited:
London, Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, 2004, no.1167

Nicola Hicks studied at the Chelsea School of Art (1978-82) and at the Royal College of Art (1982-85). She is best known for loosely rendered figurative and animal subjects, often sculpted in straw and plaster and for her lively drawings, often large sheets of brown paper. She has had major solo shows in leading museums and galleries in Britain and overseas and was made an MBE in the 1995 New Year Honours for her contribution to the visual arts.


Mrs Samuelson's Baby Angel - Bronze by Nicola Hicks

To mark the reopening of the National Portrait Gallery on 22 June I am joining Portrait Mode with an online exhibition.

Viewing is by appointment in London or Oxfordshire.

Portrait Mode

Online Exhibition

D Brucciani & Co

George Elgar Hicks

John Everett Millais

Frederic James Shields

British School

Albert Toft

Frank Lewis Emanuel

Edward Arthur Walton

Alfred Drury

Arthur Hacker

Herbert Johnson Harvey

Alfred Drury

John Da Costa

Edmund Van Someren

Jenny Zillhardt

Frederick James Halnon

William Henry Barribal

William Shackleton

William Henry Barribal

Richard Louis Garbe

Cecil Beaton

John Whitlock Codner

Neville Hickman

Oliver Messel

Mary Adshead

Carolyn Sergeant

Carolyn Sergeant

Carolyn Sergeant

John Sergeant

John Sergeant

John Sergeant

John Sergeant

Nicola Hicks