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Lot Essay
Lucian Freud had entered the Central School of Arts and Crafts in 1938, aged fifteen, where drawing was taught by William Roberts and Bernard Meninsky. However, Freud took the general course, on his father's instructions, which did not include instruction in draughtmanship. Freud wanted to be a painter but he did not actually start to work in this medium until he had enrolled at the East Anglian School of Drawing and Painting in Dedham in Essex, in the summer of 1939, under the principal and co-founder, Cedric Morris and Lett Haines.
Here Freud met his close friends, David Carr and his future wife, Barbara Gilligan, who were fellow students. Soon after he had arrived, and after a night of smoking with his new friends, the school was burned down, forcing Freud to leave abruptly. His father's influence had enabled him to obtain an ID card for the Merchant Navy and he embarked from Liverpool Docks for the rest of the war years.
'The drawings of fellow crew members of the boat he sailed on were made in an ordinary Winsor and Newton pad, the oil colours in some of them applied with his fingers. The line has a nervous, almost tremulous quality ... the medium with which these drawings were made also varies. Some were made in pen, others in pencil and crayon, and [another] was made with the point of a brush. Nevertheless, we may say with some confidence that Freud's work was increasing in tightness of line, and in tension generally, in these years' (see N. Penny, loc. cit.).
Here Freud met his close friends, David Carr and his future wife, Barbara Gilligan, who were fellow students. Soon after he had arrived, and after a night of smoking with his new friends, the school was burned down, forcing Freud to leave abruptly. His father's influence had enabled him to obtain an ID card for the Merchant Navy and he embarked from Liverpool Docks for the rest of the war years.
'The drawings of fellow crew members of the boat he sailed on were made in an ordinary Winsor and Newton pad, the oil colours in some of them applied with his fingers. The line has a nervous, almost tremulous quality ... the medium with which these drawings were made also varies. Some were made in pen, others in pencil and crayon, and [another] was made with the point of a brush. Nevertheless, we may say with some confidence that Freud's work was increasing in tightness of line, and in tension generally, in these years' (see N. Penny, loc. cit.).