AN ENGLISH CUBIST

WILLIAM ROBERTS:

St George and the Dragon + study

Illustration © The Estate of John David Roberts. 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.

St George and the Dragon – study, 1915
Pencil, 24.5 cm x 19 cm

'William Roberts's study for his "St. George and the Dragon" . . . is the epitome of Vorticist impatience with old-fashioned English ways. Drawn for the St. George's Day issue of a mass-market London evening newspaper [the Evening News], it shows – in the words of Richard Cork, the historian of Vorticism – "a resolutely streamlined saint, an impersonal robot whose figure merges with the paraphernalia of 20th-century civilization"' – John Russell, 'When Artistic Rebels Set England Aglow', New York Times, 15 Nov. 1987.
PROVENANCE: Sotheby's 11 Dec. 1968 (£400) > ? > Anthony d'Offay > private collection (Aug. 1989) > Christie's 21 Mar. 2023 (£239,400)
EXHIBITION HISTORY: Anthony d'Offay Gallery (2) 1969, Hayward Gallery 1974, New York 1977, Anthony d'Offay Gallery (2) 1980, Anthony d'Offay Gallery (1) 1982, New Haven 1983, Anthony d'Offay Gallery 1986, Venice 1986, New York 1987, Durham, NC, 2010

*

St George and the Dragon, 1915
(pub. Evening News (London), 23 Apr. 1915)

EXHIBITION HISTORY : Hayward Gallery 1974 (photo 'facsimile of the lost line drawing (perhaps) by Roberts himself' – Richard Cork)