Portrait bust of Robert Sainsbury

Commissioned as a companion piece to the portrait of Lisa Sainsbury, the sitter is shown with his jaw thrust forward and looking upward. This attitude may have been suggested by the unusual circumstances of the sitter, for Robert Sainsbury had been injured in a blackout accident and was confined to bed. Epstein, departing from his normal practice of insisting that sitters come to his studio, commenced the portrait in the hospital bedroom and completed it in the studio.

In keeping with Epstein’s manner of treating male sitters, all of the features are rendered in a more robust fashion than those of Lisa. The highly worked surfaces catch the light at many different angles, thereby imbuing the work with a sense of movement, and accentuating the character of the head.

Two casts of these two heads were made, for family purposes, in 1992.

Entry taken from Robert and Lisa Sainsbury Collection 3 volume catalogue, edited by Steven Hooper (Yale University Press, 1997).