3 February
–
23 April 2006
Section
1: Defining DocumentaryLawrence Gowing 1918-1991
Mrs Roberts 1944
© Tate, London 2002
This portrait of Mrs Ellen Roberts, Gowings' cleaning lady, was painted at his home in Paultons Square, Chelsea. The painting is both a portrait of a 'type' and an individual. While there is a sense of intimacy or familiarity between artist and sitter in this work, there is also a certain distance implicit in the sitter's averted gaze and the use of her formal address in the title. Social relationships and hierarchies, here between artist and servant, are thus perhaps intimated in this painting.
Learn more about this
work in the Tate Collection