Lot Essay
‘Philpot was not only one of the most gifted portrait painters in a long British tradition, but also an original and sensitive artist, whose work has a recognisably individual beauty of technique and a virility of style and concept’ (R. Gibson, Glyn Philpot 1884-1937 Edwardian Aesthete to Thirties Modernist, London, 1985, p. 35).
Portrait of Patrick Buchan-Hepburn, Lord Hailes, 1934, is one of the most striking portraits that Philpot painted in his most prolific period of the 1930s. During this time Philpot began to move away from the Edwardian Romantic aesthetic that pre-occupied his early work to a more Modernist style. As seen in the present work there was now a greater emphasis on the harmonisation of colour and tone, which, paired with a renewed interest in surface and line, along with a looser brushstroke, imbued a heightened expressiveness of character. Albert Charles Sewter wrote, ‘These pictures revealed his consummate mastery of technique, his command of an unusual beauty of surface and colour, and his instinctive grasp of expressive pose and composition … Their rich and sonorous tonality, their strong, unusual, and subtly harmonized colour schemes, pointed clearly to the arrival of a master’ (A.C. Sewter (intro.), G. Philpot 1884-1937, London, 1951, p. 3).
Philpot enjoyed early success as a portrait painter securing important commissions to paint the Princess Helena Victoria, Lady Patricia Ramsay, Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, and H.M. King Fouad I, who he painted in Egypt in 1923. The present work depicts Patrick Buchan-Hepburn (1901-1974), who served as personal secretary to Winston Churchill before being elected to Parliament in 1929. He rose through the ranks to become Chief Whip and Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury from 1951 to 1955. In 1957 he was appointed the title of Baron Hailes before relocating to the Port of Spain on the island of Trinidad, serving as Governor-General for four years. After the state dissolved Buchan-Hepburn returned to England where he served as Chairman of the Historic Buildings Council for the remainder of his career.
Portrait of Patrick Buchan-Hepburn, Lord Hailes, 1934, is one of the most striking portraits that Philpot painted in his most prolific period of the 1930s. During this time Philpot began to move away from the Edwardian Romantic aesthetic that pre-occupied his early work to a more Modernist style. As seen in the present work there was now a greater emphasis on the harmonisation of colour and tone, which, paired with a renewed interest in surface and line, along with a looser brushstroke, imbued a heightened expressiveness of character. Albert Charles Sewter wrote, ‘These pictures revealed his consummate mastery of technique, his command of an unusual beauty of surface and colour, and his instinctive grasp of expressive pose and composition … Their rich and sonorous tonality, their strong, unusual, and subtly harmonized colour schemes, pointed clearly to the arrival of a master’ (A.C. Sewter (intro.), G. Philpot 1884-1937, London, 1951, p. 3).
Philpot enjoyed early success as a portrait painter securing important commissions to paint the Princess Helena Victoria, Lady Patricia Ramsay, Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, and H.M. King Fouad I, who he painted in Egypt in 1923. The present work depicts Patrick Buchan-Hepburn (1901-1974), who served as personal secretary to Winston Churchill before being elected to Parliament in 1929. He rose through the ranks to become Chief Whip and Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury from 1951 to 1955. In 1957 he was appointed the title of Baron Hailes before relocating to the Port of Spain on the island of Trinidad, serving as Governor-General for four years. After the state dissolved Buchan-Hepburn returned to England where he served as Chairman of the Historic Buildings Council for the remainder of his career.