Original Pen and Ink Drawing’the Lovers’ by Toby Horne Shepherd 1909-1993. Signed. Circa 1965/70

Lovely quality pen and ink drawing from a series of small works that the artist produced called 'The Lovers'. These were apparently exhibited at a show at St Martins school of art when Toby was teaching there. Born in Dundee and educated at Harris Academy, he attended the Dundee School of Art from 1924-1926 and then Glasgow School of Art where, in 1927, he won a travelling scholarship and prizes for portrait and landscape. In 1929 he took the Painting Diploma, winning a post-diploma scholarship, and became Assistant Art Teacher at Glasgow School of Art 1930-1932. A series of portrait commissions brought him down to London in 1933, and he subsequently referred to these years as the most unsatisfactory period of his artistic life. He became a lecturer at Shoreditch Training College from 1937 until he joined the National Fire Service in 1941. He was appointed Senior Art Lecturer in 1947 and remained at Shoreditch until 1954. Thereafter he had a number of part-time teaching posts, including Ealing School of Art, St Martin’s School of Art and the Sir John Cass School of Art. He retired in 1974, Provenance; Helen Hale, the artist’s widow.