Signed l.l.: E.R.Hughes

Black and white chalk on brown paper, 28 by 37.5 cm (11 by 14 ¾ ins)

Provenance: Christie's, London, 8 November 1996, lot 37

Hughes was studio assistant to the great Pre-Raphaelite painter William Holman Hunt and an increasingly invaluable figure as Hunt suffered from Glaecoma in the later part of his life. He consequently had a significant hand in several of his master’s great late works including The Light of the World and The Lady of Shalott. His own work is nevertheless extremely distinct and he developed his own style of late of late Pre Raphaelite painting and drawing which is frequently rich in both fantasy and symbolism. He was nephew of the painter Arthur Hughes, another key figure in the Pre Raphaelite movement.