AN ENGLISH CUBIST

WILLIAM ROBERTS:

Milking Goats

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Milking Goats, 1948–53
Pen and ink, 22.5 cm x 15 cm

This was sold at Sotheby's on 3 Mar. 1999 in a lot with drawings produced for Ernest Cooper's London Health Centre Ltd, although there is no record of it being used in an LHC publication. It is likely that the drawing was produced between 1948 and 1953, when Roberts undertook a number of drawings and designs for Cooper. At a later date (after 1977) it was reproduced in large numbers as a greetings card for Cooper. It is probable that the drawing was exhibited by Cooper at Worthing in 1972, but it is not clearly identified in the catalogue. A pencil drawing entitled Farmyard with Goats and Geese was owned by Cooper in 1977, and it is likely that it is a study for Milking Goats. A detail of this subject, a man milking a goat, is on the verso of the drawing The Critic Intervenes c.1948.
PROVENANCE: Ernest Cooper > Sotheby's 3 Mar. 1999 (lot 120, with 12 other drawings, £10,925) > Abbott & Holder.
EXHIBITION HISTORY: Worthing 1972 (?); Abbott & Holder 1999 ( where dated c.1945)
Cf. The Goats 1952