Frank Auerbach

Frank Auerbach

(b. 1931 Berlin, Germany – immigrated to Great Britain 1939 – lives in London, England)

Nude, 1954 Charcoal on paper 45.5 x 54.5 cm Signed and dated (top left): ‘Auerbach 1954’ Ben Uri Collection: Presented by members of Society c.1950s

One of two early art school life drawings in the Ben Uri Collection (very likely using the same model), Nude was probably observed in the RCA life room and shows the beginnings of Auerbach’s distinctive vigorous and heavily worked style. Born to Jewish parents in Berlin in 1931, Auerbach was sent to England in 1939; his parents remained behind and subsequently perished in concentration camps. After attending Bunce Court – a progressive boarding school in Kent for Jewish refugee children – he studied at St Martin’s School of Art (1948–52) and the Royal College of Art, also taking evening classes at Borough Polytechnic under David Bomberg, going on to become one of Britain’s best-known contemporary artists.

Frank Auerbach

(b. 1931 Berlin, Germany – immigrated to Great Britain 1939 – lives in London, England)

Michael, 1990 Etching 20 x 16.5 cm Signed and dated (lower right) ‘Auerbach 90’ Ben Uri Collection Presented by the artist 1994

The son of German-Jewish refugees, Michael Podro was Head of Art History at Camberwell School of Art (1961–67), when he and Auerbach became friends. He went on to Cambridge, then the Slade School of Art, before embarking on a PhD under art historian Ernst Gombrich and philosopher Richard Wollheim. He has observed of Auerbach’s work that the artist ‘has a constantly self-revising dynamic which never allows the subject to disengage from the distinctive properties of the painter’s medium’.