Major R. H. Raymond Smythies (1912)

Henri Gaudier-Brzeska

plaster

Tate, London, Liverpool and St Ives

Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-ND (3.0 Unported) Photo credit: Tate, London

Classification:

Sculpture

Materials:

Plaster

Physical Object Description:

Inscribed on back: ‘H. Gaudier-Brzeska’

Dimensions:

44.5 x 22.9 x 23.5 cm

Accession Number:

T01160

Credit:

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 1969

Scheme:

Gift

Ownership history:

Purchased from the intestate estate of the late Miss Sophie Brzeska (1872-1925) through the Treasury Solicitor by C. Frank Stoop (1863-1933); by whom gifted to the Contemporary Art Society, 1930; presented to the Tate Gallery, 1969

Relationship:

Sophie (Zofia) Suzanne Brzeska Tate, London, Liverpool and St Ives C. (Cornelius) Frank Stoop

Subject:

Bust, Major, Man, Portraits

Major Raymond Smythies (1860-1939) was a commissioned officer in the Prince of Wales's Volunteers. He retired from the Army in 1903. His friend Haldane Macfall, another retired Army officer, sat to Gaudier-Brzeska for a portrait bust early in 1912, and Macfall must have introduced Major Raymond Smythies to the sculptor. Major Raymond Smythies was pleased with the portrait head and paid £12 to have it cast into bronze. He gave his bronze cast to Manchester City Art Gallery in 1922; at Smythies's request, the bronze was shown in the Gaudier-Brzeska Memorial Exhibition at the Leicester Galleries, London in 1918 under the title ‘Head of a Military Officer’. The original plaster version which remained in the sculptor's possession, and then on his death in 1915 passed to Sophie Brzeska (1872-1925), his companion, is now at the Tate, purchased in 1930 from the intestate estate of the late Miss Sophie Brzeska through the Treasury Solicitor by C. Frank Stoop (1863-1933), who presented it to the Contemporary Art Society the same year.

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