Robert Bevan

Bevan’s son who often accompanied his father on drawing expeditions recalled that his father ‘rather relished looking like a man who had to do more with horses and hounds than with canvas and paint ... He always looked at home at Tattersall’s and other places where the horse took the centre of the stage. He looked neither like a Bohemian nor like a business-man ... As children we were very conscious of the importance of the horse in our father’s life. We were often allowed to go with him when he was making drawings ... At Tattersall’s and Aldridge’s, the Barbican and Ward’s Repository there would always be a word or two with dealers and with handlers – and even with the bearded, top-hatted auctioneer – who all seemed rather surprised that anyone should think they were worth drawing’ (R.A. Bevan, Robert Bevan 1865–1925: A Memoir by his Son, London 1965, p.20).

The horse auction offered Bevan an opportunity to make spontaneous studies and sketches, in which the horses were as keenly observed as the jostling crown around them. This example is Bevan’s preparatory study for his famous lithograph the Horse Dealers (Ward’s Repository No.1). The piece displays a combination of Bevan's distinctive simplification of form, outline drawing, subtle handling of shade and colour and careful balance in the composition, together creating an evocative rendering of the auction sale.