Drawings

On leaving the Slade Richard entered into a fairly hard time surviving at first in a very unsuitable attic and then in a basement room in London, painting, drawing and walking everywhere to galleries trying to get sales.

He exhibited a drawing at the New English Art Club but it didn’t sell. Richard did not have his paints with him when he went home for Christmas 1927, so he worked on some drawings over the holiday period and into the new year. He took these back to London and when he showed them to galleries they started to take some interest.

A friend who worked at the Treasury put him in touch with Mr Stocks an art collector who worked there. He had a couple of Duncan Grant pictures in his office. When Stocks visited Richard, he said that Edward Marsh should have a look. He was a well-known art collector and patron of young artists and also a director of the Goupil Gallery and private secretary to Winston Churchill. Richard recalled Marsh’s momentous visit when he arrived after some formal function. He bought a small painting but was not encouraging.

However he contacted Richard later, having bought one of his drawings [Bedroom Interior aka Nude Boy in a Bedroom (1928)] at St George’s Gallery. 'It is very delightful and has the added charm of colour. I snatched it away from an old gentleman who asked for it a minute after I had told Howell [the gallery owner] I would have it! I only hope he will have bought another instead. I should like to tell you how much I enjoyed your drawings - an achievement.’

Richard’s drawings at this time held more of his own particular character and style than his paintings where he was still trying to forge his own identity. Marsh put him in touch with the Goupil Gallery, which took some drawings and managed to sell a few. The director told Richard that Eric Gill was coming to visit him. Gill didn’t seem to like his paintings but a few days later the director wrote saying they would give Richard a one-man exhibition in 1929 . . . of drawings.

About this time Richard's father visited his basement flat for the first time. He was not happy with the conditions there and persuaded Richard to move. He found an attic flat four flights up in Earl's Court. Richard's father gave him an allowance of £10 a month, half of which went on rent. The light from a window overlooking the garden was perfect. Richard lived there for the next five years. It was also where he met his future wife when his sister brought Mavis Pope on one of her visits. 

He had six months to deliver these drawings, each one taking at least a week to produce. His mother enticed him back to Ilkley for most of this time so he could work uninterrupted and be fed and looked after. He worked to a strict regime.

. . . 'Ever since that year I have stuck to this working plan. That is that painting must have ‘office hours’ like any other job. A visitor is not welcomed as an excuse to down tools and any domestic job that requires attention must wait.’

In early December his mother went into a sanatorium in Somerset. She invited Richard to visit and also urged him to see a Mrs Green who was in the last stages of TB. She wanted to talk about art. So he duly went along to her room. They had a lively conversation and she left a strong impression on him. Back in his room he painted a portrait of her from memory, which is now in Southampton City Art Gallery.

The Private View for his Goupil show was on the 5th December, 6 weeks after the Wall Street Crash when nothing was selling in London galleries. There were two other shows at the Goupil. His exhibition was in the first room through which people had to go to see the others. In this way his work attracted even more people some of whom found his drawings more interesting than the shows they had come to see!

However he did sell a good number of drawings, many of which went to patrons like Marsh and Sir Michael Sadler, who later placed these pictures in public collections round the country. And at this private view, he was introduced to Christopher Wood, the painter, whom he admired greatly. The memory of that short conversation and Wood’s advice ‘to paint what you love and be damned to fashions which come and go’ remained with him for the rest of his life.