Robert Colquhoun, 
British 1914-1962 - 
A Drunk Man looks at the Thistle, 1962; 
ink on paper, signed...

Robert Colquhoun, 
British 1914-1962 - 

A Drunk Man looks at the Thistle, 1962; 

ink on paper, signed indistinctly lower left 'Colquhoun', 39 x 48.3 cm (ARR)

Provenance: 
the Collection of Bernard Sheridan (1927-2007) since at least 1976 and thence by descent 

Exhibited: 
The Scottish Arts Council, Edinburgh, 'The Need to Draw', 1976 touring exhibition, no.64 (label attached to the reverse of the frame) 

Note: 
according to the note on the partial label attached to the reverse of the frame, this work is amongst the last works that the artist made before his untimely death in 1962. The subject of the work is based on the title of a poem by Scottish writer Hugh McDiarmid, published in 1926. The poem is written in a distinct Scottish dialect and is considered one of the major modernist works of the 20th Century. 

This extraordinary image demonstrates the power at the heart of Robert Colquhoun's work, marking his importance alongside his contemporaries Lucien Freud and Francis Bacon in Post-War British painting. Drawing on his own personal experience and understanding of humanity, here Colquhoun has created an image that is at once statuesque and fragile, drawing on his Scottish heritage. 

Colquhoun was a central figure in the artistic world of war-time London, alongside his life-partner Robert MacBryde and their friends John Craxton and John Minton. Colquhoun and MacBryde (or 'The Two Roberts' as they were called) shot to fame under the patronage of Peter Watson, with important exhibitions of their work held at The Lefevre Gallery, The Whitechapel Gallery and numerous international mixed exhibitions. Most recently their work was the subject of a major retrospective at The National Galleries of Scotland in 2014-15. The artist's style was strongly influenced by his friend and neighbour in Soho during the 1940s, Polish artist Jankel Adler. Adler had travelled to Glasgow, where Colquhoun studied, as a refugee during the war and became a central figure of European modernism in Britain. In London, Colquhoun would develop from Adler a post-Cubist approach to the human form, breaking down features to create a heightened sense of expression.