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Self-portrait with beard |
Capturing the soul in bronze
The philandering charisma of epic sculptor Jacob Epstein is brought to life in a 50th anniversary exhibition, writes Gerald Isaaman
THE 50th anniversary this year of the death of the epic sculptor Jacob Epstein has provided a sublime moment – and, of course, an exhibition – for Agi Katz, creator of the Boundary Gallery in St John’s Wood.
Agi has been a devoted admirer of the art of Epstein for more than 30 years, fascinated also by his attraction to women, and to one in particular, Kathleen Garman, his muse and mistress for 40 years.
Garman was the woman whom Epstein’s wife Margaret took a pot-shot at with a small pistol to try to discourage her attentions, but in the end she had to succumb to her husband’s philandering ways.
When Margaret died, Garman, who ran away from home at 17 for a Bohemian life in Bloomsbury – married him and become Lady Epstein when the sculptor was honoured with a knighthood in 1954.
“I have Epstein’s ‘First Portrait of Kathleen’, the portrait bronze he created in 1921, the year he met her and she became his muse,” Agi told me.
“I bought it some years ago at an auction, having waited for 10 years for it to come up for sale. Epstein shows his wonderful feeling of love he had for her and the work is not for sale.”
But ‘First Portrait of Kathleen’ will be the highlight of the exhibition, which opens tomorrow (Friday) and runs until December 20.
“For me, Epstein was the finest sculptor able to capture the soul of his sitter in bronze,” explains Agi. “His was an amazing talent that could convey feelings in a way no other modern sculptor could.
He certainly was a great lover of women.
He had tremendous charisma, as well as being well read and a lover of music, and he could talk about all these things in his conservation.
“I put on an exhibition of his work some years ago and it was extraordinary the number of women who came and claimed they had known Epstein intimately. The shame is I never met him.”
Kitty and Esther, Kathleen’s children by Epstein, are also depicted in bronzes in the show, along with Epstein’s grandchildren Peggy Jean, Anne and Annabel. Epstein’s interest in female sexuality is shown in other spontaneous watercolour works in the exhibition, in particular featuring Sunita, who modelled for him from 1924 onwards, and other models known as Nan, Meum and Betty May.
It is a wide-ranging exhibition of true talent that takes in a 1934 bronze portrait of George Bernard Shaw – who first suggested that the New York-born Epstein came to London when they met in Paris – and a bronze maquette of St Michael and the Devil, the major work he was commissioned to do for Coventry Cathedral.
The latter work, owned by a local collector, is for sale at £40,000, while brilliant illustrations Epstein made for Baudelaire’s Fleurs du Mal, which haunted him throughout his life, appearing in a 1940 Folio Society edition, can be bought for £3,000.
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