ARTHUR HACKER, R.A. | SAYING GRACE

Capes Dunn, 1 May 2018, lot 209

Hacker was a founder member in 1886 of the New English Art Club, which showcased British painting influenced by Impressionistic ideas from France. Hacker’s obituarist in The Times noted his loose, continental manner of painting: ‘People supposed that this foreign manner was necessarily artistic; it was at least a change from the old British manner of anecdote and the old British way of painting it. Mr Hacker did at any rate, while setting one object upon a canvas, remember that he had also to paint others. He gave us atmosphere, subordination, and colours that did not compete with one another like noises in the street.’ This study predates his finished picture, The Little Mother (1912), exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1913, featuring the same little boy saying grace before a meal.