Description

‘Girl in Brown’ Oil on canvas c1915 by Derwent Lees.

Exhibited: City of Bradford Art Gallery Jubilee Exhibition 1954Derwent Lees was born in Melbourne in 1885, dying in London in 1931. He trained at the Slade School of Fine Art, London and taught at the school from 1908. He was active in Paris, and later, in Russia, Germany, Belgium and Italy. Lee’s painting ‘Pear Tree in Blossom’ featured in the exhibition ‘Tableaux Britanniques modern de la Tate Gallery’ (Modern British paintings from the Tate Gallery) at the Musée du Jeu de Paume in Paris in 1946. His paintings show the influence of Innes and Augustus John, with whom he was closely associated at the beginning of his career and whose model Euphemia Lamb, he married. He exhibited with the New English Art Club and held his first exhibition at the Chenil Galleries in 1913. Painted in the spirit of the N.E.A.C., his figure paintings, portraits and drawings became well known in London.His work is represented in the collections of the Tate Gallery London, the Manchester City Art Gallery, as well as many other provincial British galleries, the Art Gallery of New South Wales and the Art Gallery of South Australia.

Biblio:McCulloch Encyclopedia of Australian Art; Bénézit:Dictionnaire des Peintres; 20th Century Painters & Sculptors.

Image Dimensions 55cm x 50cm.