Signed lower right, oil on canvas

(76cm x 63.5cm (30in x 25in))

Exhibited: The Mayor Gallery, London

Note: David Carr is a fascinating though somewhat overlooked figure in 20th century British art. Born into a wealthy London family, Carr had to actively defy his father?s wishes that he continue within the family business, instead breaking free to pursue his art career. He studied in Byam Shaw School in the late 1930s, and then pivotally at Cedric Morris?s East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing where fellow students included the likes of Lucien Freud. Although Carr was a prominent figure in the Norfolk Contemporary Art Society and was included by Bryan Robertson in a survey of British painting at Whitechapel Art Gallery in 1953 and in a show at Southampton City Art Gallery a few years later, it was not until a major retrospective of his work at the Mayor Gallery in 1987 that his true stature was appreciated in London. The exhibition tied in with the publication of a monograph David Carr, the Discovery of an Artist by Bryan Robertson & Ronald Alley. In 1997 his work was shown alongside that of his friend Prunella Clough at Austin/Desmond Fine Art. He is also remembered for having been a staunch supporter and collector of the works of his friend?s and peer group, including Roberts Colquhoun and MacBryde, and other members of the Soho art set.