London, Leicester Galleries, Artists of Fame and Promise, 1948 (illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, no. 181);
London, Tate Gallery, William Roberts, A.R.A., 1965 (illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, no. 77). This exhibition toured to Newcastle, Laing Art Gallery and Manchster, Whitworth Art Gallery, Arts Council;
Worthing Art Gallery, Paintings and Drawing by William Roberts, 1972 (illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, no. 23);
Leeds, University Gallery, William Roberts and Jacob Kramer, Ben Uri Gallery, April – September 2003 (illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, no. 24, p. 17);
Woking, The Lightbox, The Ingram Collection: The Art of William Roberts, 24 September – 18 December 2011;
Aberystwyth, Aberystwyth Arts Centre, The Human Face, 27 January – 12 March 2016
This painting covers several of the artist’s favourite themes: portraiture, the artist and his family, flowers and all manner of human activity. Roberts’ sense of humanity is underpinned by the clarity of his painting and drawing and the light influence of Cubism and to a lesser extent, Vorticism, on his work. It is highly likely that the sitter is William Roberts’ wife, Sarah, the sister of Jacob Kramer, for whom she often modelled. In the collections of the National Galleries of Scotland there is a portrait of her by Roberts dated about 1925, showing her wearing a hat and in a similar pose; the likeness is considerable.
