Verso: Traces of Sketch of Bison

c.1912–13

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In Tate Britain

Prints and Drawings Room

View by appointment

Artist: Henri Gaudier-Brzeska 1891–1915
Medium: Ink on paper
Dimensions: Support: 216 x 343 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by C. Frank Stoop through the Contemporary Art Society 1930
Reference: N04528

Display caption

The artist Claude Lovat Fraser supported Gaudier in several ways, including the gift of tickets to Regents Park Zoo in London. There Gaudier spent his weekends sketching the animals so quickly that
the ink was often still wet as he turned
the page. With a few elegant lines and
no shading, he managed to convey
three-dimensional form and capture
a momentary view of a beast in movement. Resting or alert, standing or pacing,
each animal's unique personality
is encapsulated in these drawings.

Gallery label, September 2004

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Catalogue entry

N04528 BISON c. 1912–13

Inscr. ‘Buffalo’ b.r. (not by the artist).
Pen and ink on brown paper, 8 1/2×13 1/2 (22×34·5).
Presented by C. Frank Stoop through the Contemporary Art Society 1930.
Coll: As for No.4514.
Exh: Temple Newsam, Leeds, June–August 1943 (89).

There are traces of another sketch of a bison on the back. Another sketch of a bison, on similar paper, is in the British Museum. See also N03339.

Published in:
Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture, London 1964, I