Glyn Warren Philpot

Mrs Gerard Simpson

1937

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Not on display

Artist: Glyn Warren Philpot 1884–1937
Medium: Oil paint on canvas
Dimensions: Support: 978 x 244 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by the Trustees of the Chantrey Bequest 1937
Reference: N04893

Catalogue entry

N04893 MRS GERARD SIMPSON 1937

Not inscribed.
Canvas, 38 1/2×29 1/2 (98×75).
Chantrey Purchase from the artist 1937.
Exh: R.A., 1937 (166); Tate Gallery, July–August 1938 (West Corridor, unnumbered); Worthing, September–October 1962 (30).
Repr: Royal Academy Illustrated, 1937, p.24.

This portrait was painted in April 1937 and was followed by another which is owned by the sitter. According to the sitter, now Mrs Edward Douglas, ‘The second portrait was painted in 1937 and finished a fortnight before Glyn Philpot's death. I was wearing a black satin evening dress with a large black bow across the front of the dress, lined in pale grey. It is a three-quarter length portrait. He worked meticulously and made a great many drawings. I gave him about twenty sittings for each portrait. He was an extremely entertaining man and from his conversation he seemed more interested in ballet than in painting and was always full of stories about his social experiences in London’ (letter of 11 November 1958).

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