The Artist's Brother, Harry

Harry was the artist's eldest brother and another frequent model, particularly from 1912-15 when Gertler lived in an attic studio at 32 Elder Street, Spitalfields, with Harry, his wife Anne and their baby, Rene, occupying the floors below. Harry entered his father's furriery business (later joined by his younger brother Jack), which survived several bankruptcies and fires but eventually folded in the 1930s. Harry's large, widely spaced eyes and full lips lend this ostensibly formal portrait a sensuality which, together with his confident pose, helps capture the sense of a real and immediate presence. It was greatly admired by George Howard Darwin, Plumian Professor of Astronomy, Cambridge (1883-1912), and father of the painter and engraver Gwen Darwin (later Raverat), Gertler's fellow Slade pupil, who commissioned his own portrait (National Portrait Gallery), as a result. In later paintings, c. 1913, under the influence of post-Impressionism, Gertler transformed Harry into a radical, simplified 'peasant' figure far removed from this Edwardian portrayal.