AN ENGLISH CUBIST

WILLIAM ROBERTS:

Crossing the Minch

Illustration © The Estate of John David Roberts. Reproduced with the permission of the William Roberts Society. Catalogue information based on the catalogue raisonné by David Cleall. For this and full details of the exhibitions cited, see the links below. Any auction prices quoted may not include all fees and taxes, such as VAT and Artist's Resale Right charges.

Crossing the Minch, 1946–7
Pen, ink and watercolour, 35.5 cm x 25.5 cm

This is one of a series of four drawings inspired by a visit that William and Sarah Roberts made to the Outer Hebrides: 'this one commemorates a particularly unpleasant sea-crossing undergone by the artist and his wife' – Tate Gallery 1965 catalogue, p. 29. The trip was likely to have been planned with Sarah's friend Victoria Kingsley, a collector of international folk music, who had become interested in Hebridean songs and spent some time on Barra learning Gaelic.
PROVENANCE: Leicester Galleries > Ernest Cooper (20 gns) > Sotheby's 21 June 1995 (£5,175)
EXHIBITION HISTORY: Leicester Galleries (3) 1949 (sold for 20 gns), Tate Gallery 1965, Worthing 1972
Cf. Evening in Oban, Gateway to the Western Isles and Graveyard at Barra