“How are you going to paint me? As a cherub or as a bulldog?” begins a portrait commissioned by artist Graham Sutherland to celebrate the public figure’s 80th birthday. Prior to production, Winston Churchill famously asked the public figure.
“It all depends on what you show me, sir,” Sutherland replied.
As it turns out, Bulldog appears to have dominated the remainder of the research and completion of the 1954 portrait, which famously was destroyed in a fire a few years later by the brother of Churchill’s secretary.
Now comes a study of the final product, which Churchill described as “filthy and vicious” and whose devastation was captured in the TV series crownwill be auctioned by Sotheby’s later this year on the 150th anniversary of the British statesman’s birth.
“Churchill could be a difficult man for artists to get along with,” said Bryn Sayles, Sotheby’s director of modern and postwar British art, who also mentioned William Orpen. ), Walter Sickert and Oswald Birley among other commissions. She added that the timing of the work added to the stress of the situation because “[Churchill] Having recently suffered a stroke and with a lot of internal strife within the Conservative Party, pressure is building on him to resign.
Graham Sutherland, Studies of Sir Winston Churchill1954, oil on canvas (est. £500,000-800,000) Courtesy of Sotheby’s
While the final portrait is a striking depiction of the man facing the viewer head-on, the one for sale offers a more relaxed, intimate depiction of the man seated in the afternoon sun. It’s unclear how much research went into the work, but the auction house said it is “one of the finest extant Churchill portraits associated with the commission in Sutherland” and that other works are currently held at Canada’s Beaver Booker Art Gallery . Sutherland gifted the work to Alfred Hecht, one of the leading cartographers of the time, who in turn gifted it to its private owner.
The auction house will display the work (April 16-21) at the Churchill family’s Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire, where Churchill was born in 1874. Exhibited there.
A wide range of collectors are expected. Connoisseurs of Sutherland’s work may appreciate the artist’s portraits, to which he turned later in his career, while interest in Churchill is both intense and international (indeed, some of the largest Churchill memorabilia are reportedly Collections are all in the United States)).
“We also anticipate collectors will be interested in portraiture because of the impact of the final work and the way it captures the wider relationship between artist and sitter – it provides a new perspective on who has the right to decide whether a portrait is right for the artist, the photographer, the public Even the successful presentation of art history,” Sayles said.
