The Serpentine, 1925

Walter Sickert RA (1860 - 1942)

RA Collection: Art

The drawing shows a view of Kensington Gardens looking towards the Serpentine lake. Sickert had begun drawing landscapes again in 1924; Wendy Baron notes that the following year, 'Henry Rayner remembers Sickert making meticulous drawings in Kensington Gardens in June 1925 when painting The Serpentine'. Henry Hewitt Rayner (ca. 1902-1957), an Australian-born etcher, draughtsman and pupil and friend of Sickert in the mid- to late 1920s, wrote a memoir, Red-Violet (in manuscript form), which notes that he worked alongside Sickert in Kensington Gardens on 27 June 1925.

A number of related drawings and paintings exist, including The Serpentine (oil on canvas, 40.6 x 50.8 cm, Christie's, 10 June 2005), The Serpentine (oil on canvas, Victoria Art Gallery, Bath) and Study for 'The Serpentine' (pencil and wash, heightened with white on grey paper, 22.2 x 29.2 cm). The same view can be seen in Kensington Gardens (The Serpentine) (watercolour and graphite on paper, 18.5 x 18 cm, James Hyman Fine Art).

This drawing was in the collection of Carel Weight RA and is one of two works by Sickert that he bequeathed to the Royal Academy.