An Epstein A-Z

K is for Knighthood

Although American by birth, Epstein took British citizenship in 1910 and so was eligible for the knighthood he received in 1954.

L is for Liverpool

Epstein received a commission to decorate the John Lewis department store in Liverpool in 1954. Liverpool Resurgent, a large male bronze nude representing the rebirth of Liverpool after the Second World War, was unveiled in 1956. According to a Liverpool Post article in 2003, 90% of Liverpudlians refer to this statue as Dickie Lewis.

M is for Marriage

Epstein married twice. His first marriage, to Margaret (Peggy) Dunlop, took place in 1907 and lasted until her death in 1949. In 1955 he married Kathleen Garman, who had been his mistress since the early 1920s.

N is for New York

Epstein was born at 102 Hester Street in New York. Even after he began attending classes at The Art Student's League in 1894 he considered that his main studies took place in Hester Street where he would draw the people who passed by. His family moved to 1661 Madison Avenue in 1899 but he remained in Hester Street in rented rooms. Epstein lived in New York until he moved to Paris in 1902.

O is for Oscar

Robert Ross, Oscar Wilde's literary executor, commissioned Epstein to carve Wilde's tomb. Epstein carved a large flying angel/demon based on the Assyrian winged bull sculptures in the British Museum. The work took nine months to complete and was first exhibited in Epstein's London studio, where it received favourable press. However, when the monument was transported to Paris and installed over Wilde's grave in Pere Lachaise cemetery it was covered in tarpaulin and guarded by the French police on the grounds of indecency. Epstein refused to amend the carving, and Ross arranged for a large brass plaque to cover the offending area of the monument. This plaque was later unofficially removed by an unnamed group of artists, and the monument remained covered until the beginning of the First World War.
Related Work: Study for the Tomb of Oscar Wilde

P is for Park

Epstein moved into 18 Hyde Park Gate, Knightsbridge, in 1928 and lived there until his death in 1959. Epstein's controvertial sculpture Rima, on display near the Hyde Park Gate Bird Sanctuary was variously described as "The Hyde Park Atrocity" and "A Nightmare in Stone" by the British press of the day.

Q is for Quinn

John Quinn was a New York lawyer who defined 'art' for the United States Tariff law. He was one of Epstein's earliest and most important collectors.

R is for Rockdrilll

One of Epstein's most iconic pieces, his ‘machine-like robot, visored, menacing and carrying within itself its progeny’ was a symbol of a new age, seated on an actual pneumatic drill. Following the First World War he made drastic alterations, removing its triumphalist, technological overtones and reducing it  to a more human scale.

S is for Sally

Sarah Tack Ryan, better known as Sally Ryan, was an American sculptor who introduced herself to Epstein in London in 1935 and became his only pupil. She maintained lifelong friendships with both Epstein and Kathleen Garman and, after Epstein's death, she and Kathleen created the Garman Ryan collection which is now housed at the New Art Gallery  Walsall.
Related Work: Sally Ryan

T is for Thomas

Thomas Stern Eliot sat for Epstein in 1951 after they were introduced by a mutual friend. They became close friends, and when Epstein died in 1959 Eliot wrote to Kathleen Garman to tell her that "It is as if some of my world has crumbled away."
Related Work: T S Eliot

U is for Underground

In 1929 Epstein was commissioned to produce two sculptures, Day and Night,  for the new headquarters of the London Underground Electric Railways. The commission came from the architect Charles Holden, who had given Epstein the job of decorating the British Medical Association Building in the Strand. Epstein's involvement with this project was kept secret because of the controversy that had surrounded his previous work. The carvings were made directly onto the building and Epstein eventually had a shed constructed to protect himself from the astonishment of the men on the building site and comments from passing pedestrians. When the statues were unveiled the subsequent outcry almost resulted in Day being cut off the building, and Night was vandalised with liquid tar.

V is for Vorticism

Vorticism was a British art movement formed in London in 1914 by Wyndham Lewis. It was launched in the magazine Blast, which condemned the effeteness of British art and declared an intention to express the dynamism of the modern world. The first issue of Blast contained Epstein's studies of birth. There was a second issue of the magazine, and an exhibition of Vorticist artists in 1915, but the movement did not survive beyond this.

W is for Wodehouse

Epstein met P.G Wodehouse in 1928, when he was sailing back to England from New York on the Aquitania. Lord Rothermere gave a dinner on board which both Epstein and Wodehouse attended. Wodehouse discussed stocks and shares, and Epstein was unimpressed.

X is for Xenophobia

Although it was Epstein's work that attracted so much public notoriety, some of the attacks on him were unpleasantly personal and focused on the fact that he was an a Jewish American immigrant. In 1924 the public response to The Hudson Memorial included anti-Semitic letters to the press, and in 1933 he was excluded from Eric Underwood's A Short History of English Sculpture because he was an alien.

Y is for Young

Justice George M. Young and Justice Byron S. Waite presided over a 1927 United States Customs Court hearing to determine whether Brancusi's sculpture The Bird was a work of art or a manufacture of metal. If it was found to be a manufacture of metal it was liable to be taxed at 40% of its commercial value. Epstein gave evidence in support of Brancusi, and produced in court an Ancient Egyptian sculpture of a hawk to demonstrate that Brancusi's work was not strictly modernistic but derived from ancient art. Litigation continued for two years until the court found in favour of Brancusi.

Z is for Zola

In 1902, on his second day in Paris, Epstein joined the procession to Emile Zola's funeral at the Cimetiere Montmartre, and witnessed the clashes between anti-Semites and the French police.