Hedwig E. Pillitz

(London 1896-1987)

Michael Lane, c.1930s

oil on panel

signed lower right ‘PILLITZ’ and inscribed in the artist’s hand ‘SKETCH /MICHAEL LANE/ BY H.E. PILLITZ/29. ABERCORN PLACE/NW8’ over an earlier inscription with her home address at 80 Canfield Gardens, NW6

50.5 x 40 cm.

in its original frame

Provenance

From the artist’s estate.

Though the exact identity of Michael Lane is now lost, it’s interesting to note that Pillitz describes this portrait on the reverse of the panel as a ‘sketch’, which suggests that there may be a fully worked up portrait of the sitter elsewhere, perhaps with his family.

Hedwig Pillitz was born in London to Hungarian Jewish émigrés, Arpad Armin Pillitz (1867-1947) and Josephine, née Fischer (1876-1965). She had two younger siblings, Doris (1905-1959) who became a successful stage actress, and George (1909-1981). They lived at 80 Canfield Gardens in South Hampstead, and it was there that the girls attended South Hampstead High School. By the 1920s Doris was studying drama at the Central School of Speech & Drama and Hedwig had exhibited works at the Paris Salon. It’s logical to assume that she may well have studied art in Paris. In 1924 she exhibited her first portrait at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, a portrait of ‘Madamoiselle Y’, possibly depicting the portrait photographer Yevonde (Yevonde Philone Middleton, née Cumbers (1893-1975)).

By 1926, Hedwig not only had a painting at the Paris Salon, she was also exhibiting a still life of flowers at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool. Nonetheless, portraits seem to have been her passion. She established her studio at 29 Abercorn Place in St. John’s Wood, painting a range of Bohemian and artistic sitters – fellow artists, writers, actors and models, including Marguerite Kelsey, a professional artist’s model most famously painted by Meredith Frampton (Tate Britain), the artist and novelist Barbara Comyns (with FEFA), Shulamith Shafir, a Ukrainian-Jewish concert pianist who made her London debut in 1936 aged just thirteen (Private Collection), the actress Dorothy Black (V&A, London), and the Chinese dancer and mother of contemporary Chinese dance, Tai Ai-lien (with FEFA). By 1940, when Pillitz exhibited the portrait of Tai Ai-lien at the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition, she was represented by The Rowley Gallery on Kensington Church Street, London.