Jacob Epstein: portrait sculptor

Nice exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery of portrait busts by Jacob Epstein.

These were beautifully displayed so you could walk all round most of them and were shown next to photographs of Epstein’s studios. It was a really clever use of a small space. They had been modelled in clay and cast in bronze.

Epstein aimed to capture the physiological and physical presence of the sitter. I loved a very angular head of Nehru. Also head of Lucien Freud who married Epstein’s daughter Kitty but they were divorced four years later. He really was very beautiful as a young man but I was drawn to the quote from Epstein on the commentary “That spiv Lucian Freud turned out a nasty piece of work.” 

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