[Sketch of the 'The Holy Well']

Sketch on The Berkeley Hotel, Piccadilly, London, headed paper of the oil painting 'The Holy Well' (1916).

(1916)

Ink on paper

 

Private Collection

Prints & Drawings Department

 

 

Sir William Orpen, Irish artist, born in Dublin, Orpen trained at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art before moving to London to study at the Slade School of Fine Art. He remained in London and became a highly successful portrait and subject painter. Appointed Official War Artist in 1917, Orpen left for France and was stationed at Amiens and the Somme Battlefields. He returned to London after the war and remained there until his death.

Florence Evelyn St George, eldest child of New York banker George F Baker. In 1906 while married to Howard Bligh St George she began a relationship with Sir William Orpen.