With major-name artists like Burra becoming increasingly expensive
and more contemporary talents increasingly channelling their talents into areas other than painting, Rosoman, a former teacher at the Royal College and Camberwell schools of art and a regular exhibitor at the RA, may well be due for a commercial re-assessment.
This 151/2 by 121/2in (39.5 x 32cm) gouache, pictured right, entitled Pearly King and Queen in a Lamplit Street certainly attracted interest at Bonhams Bayswater’s (15/10% buyer’s premium) September 4 sale of Oil Paintings, Watercolours and Prints, selling to the London trade for a
sale-topping £2050 against an estimate of £1200-1800.
Hardly an earth-shattering price,
but still a substantial enough sum for
a relatively small work on paper and
one which, together with the £480
(estimate £350-450) bid for an even smaller watercolour of the Plaza de Real, Barcelona, will make Rosoman a name to keep an eye on in the Modern British market.
Has Rosoman a commercial lesson for buyers of contemporary British art?
Leonard Rosoman (b.1913) is an artist whose technical skill and individuality of style has never quite captured the imagination of the art market in the way that more widely recognised contemporaries like Edward Burra have.
