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• Auction House:
  Bay East Auctions
• Sale Name:
  The Art & Book Sale
• Sale Date:
  27 May 2012 ~ 2pm
• Lot #:
  153
• Lot Description:
  George Lambert
  (1873-1930)
  Woman in a Red Dress and Black Hat (circa 1915)
  oil on canvas
  inscription on verso
• Provenance:
  Collection of Sir Tom Barr Smith; Thence by Descent; Private collection, Sydney
• Exhibited:
  'Lambert Memorial Exhibition', Anthony Hordern's Fine Art Gallery, Sydney, 25 September - 15 October 1930, no. 22
• References:
  Anne Gray, 'George Lambert 1873-1930 Catalogue Raisonné (Paintings and Sculpture, Drawings in Public Collections)', Bonamy Press, Canberra in association with Sotheby's Australia and the Australian War Memorial, 1996, no. P183, p. 60.
• Notes:
  At the beginning of World War I, George Lambert was living in London and enjoying a successful career as a portraitist. Some of these works - the full-length of the Australian Prime Minister Sir George Reid (1913-14, Historic Memorials Collection, Parliament House, Canberra), for example, or the three-quarter of Frederick Andrews, headmaster of Ackworth School (1914, coll. Ackworth School, Pontefract, Yorkshire) - were painted on commission. Others were primarily conceived as exhibition pieces: complex figure groups such as the celebrated Important People (1914, Art Gallery of New South Wales); more intimate, personal works such as the portrait of the singer Florence Schmidt, wife of Lambert's friend and colleague, the English sculptor Derwent Wood (1914-15, Queensland Art Gallery); and pictures of 'types', such as The Maid (1915, Art Gallery of New South Wales), The Smiling Sister (1915, Art Gallery of New South Wales) and The Smile of Pan (1915, Art Gallery of New South Wales). While the present work is unfinished and the identity of its sitter unconfirmed, it has the look of one of these latter, 'fancy dress' portraits. The subject's dark, almond-shaped eyes and high cheekbones and her scarlet gown and tall, soft black hat suggest some exotic ethnic quality. Anne Gray has suggested that the portrait may be of Elspeth Champcommunal, a friend of the modernist artist and critic Roger Fry, and in later life a well-known London fashion designer.1 Dr David Hansen 1. Anne Gray, 'George Lambert 1873-1930 Catalogue Raisonné (Paintings and Sculpture, Drawings in Public Collections)', Bonamy Press, Canberra, in association with Sotheby's Australia and the Australian War Memorial, 1996, nos. P182 & P183, p. 60
• Estimate:
  A$15,000 - 25,000
• Realised Price:
  *****
  

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• Category:
  Art

This Sale has been held and this item is no longer available. Details are provided for information purposes only.